Hungarian Grand Prix: Hamilton WINS – Vettel second

Lewis Hamilton wins the 2018 Hungarian Grand Prix, extending his lead of Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel who finished in second place.

The rain-affected qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix played in to Mercedes’ and Lewis Hamilton’s, hands, giving Hamilton pole position when the clever money was on a Vettel pole. And, at a track like the Hungaroring, where overtaking is tricky, pole position should be the best guarantee of victory. And it was.

Hamilton maintained the lead from the start, and apart from a pit stop lead change to Vettel, Hamilton drover superbly to take his second win on the trot and cement his lead in the driver’s title race as the F1 circus goes in to holiday mode for four weeks.

From the start, with Hamilton in the lead, Vettel managed to pass Raikkonen for third, and as Hamilton made his single pit stop on lap 25 Vettel took the lead and ran for another 15 laps. But a clumsy pit stop brought the German back out in third place behind Bottas.

That’s how it stayed until five laps from the end, when Vettel made a move on Bottas stick – and was followed by Raikkonen – with Ricciardo getting past Bottas too for fourth place as the race drew to a close, despite starting in 12th. Ricciardo’s team mate, Max Verstappen, retired on lap five as his engine gave up the ghost. 

Gasly managed sixth for Toro Rosso, Magnussen seventh for Haas, Alonso gave himself a birthday present with an eighth place finish, Sainz was ninth and Grosjean got the last points place.

There’s now a four week break for F1.