HUNGARORING QUALIFYING: HAMILTON THUMPS THEM ALL

Lewis Hamilton took his ninth pole position of 2015 with a dominant performance in qualifying for the

Hungarian Grand Prix, the Briton both opening segments before beating team-mate Nico Rosberg to top spot on the grid by over half a second.

Hamilton summed it up afterwards, “I’m incredibly happy with the weekend, I can’t remember having a performance as good as this.”

While Rosberg admitted, “I just didn’t find the pace, it’s been a bit up and down all weekend. Definitely not happy.”

Third place went to Sebastian Vettel, with Red Bull Racing’s Daniel Ricciardo finishing just three hundredths of a second adrift of the Ferrari driver to take fourth.

Vettel said, “The car kept improving, third was the maximum we could do, I am happy. Tomorrow I expect a tight race.”

The Mercedes drivers were on track early in FP1, making initial runs on the medium tyres, but with track temperatures hitting 53 degrees for the start of the session and with that contributing to a large performance gap between the two compounds it was only a matter of time before the vast majority the field took on the soft tyre.

During the early part of the medium tyre phase, Hamilton took P1 with a time of 1:24.213, with Ricciardo second and Vettel third. Rosberg, though, was fourth and complaining about excessive understeer, saying that there was “something wrong” with his car.

The main switch came when Williams’ Valtteri Bottas switched to the softs and took over in P1 with a time of 1:23.649. That was swiftly eclipsed by Red Bull’s Daniil Kvyat and then by Vettel.

Rosberg also emerged on the yellow-banded Pirellis and with his first attempt on the tyre claimed P1 with a time of 1:22.979, three tenths ahead of the Ferrari driver. Hamilton had slipped to P10 by this time and so he too bolted on the softs to be sure of smooth passage to Q2.

As the final times began to come in the men to miss out on a Q2 berth were Jenson Button, with the Briton complaining that his ERS didn’t deploy on the main straight, the Saubers of Marcus Ericsson and P18 team-mate Felipe Nasr and the Manors of Roberto Merhi and Will Stevens. Button’s McLaren pit wall admitted to the driver that the ERS failure had cost them a place in Q2.

While Hamilton made it through on the soft tyre in P1, +0.089 ahead of Rosberg, who was followed by Vettel, Kvyat and Kimi Räikkönen, Red Bull’s second driver, Daniel Ricciardo, lived on his nerves by using two sets of medium tyres in the first segment. The Australian need not have worried, as his lap of 1:24.408 was good enough to see him through in 12th place, three tenths clear of the P16 drop zone time set by Button.

Q2 began with Vettel making the running with a lap of 1:23.168s, but the action was halted soon after when Fernando Alonso’s McLaren ground to a halt at the exit of Turn 13. With the car being close to the pit entry approach the red flags came out with just over seven and a half minutes left on the clock.

When the green lights appeared at the pit exit, Hamilton, who had not set a time, was quickly out on track and he took over at the top of the order with a lap of 1:22.285. Rosberg was now second almost half a second back, with Vettel third ahead of Ricciardo.

In the drop zone with a minute to go were Carlos Sainz on P11, followed by Force India’s Sergio Perez and the twin Lotus cars of Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado.

Grosjean was the man to profit, the Frenchman jumping from 13th place to 10th with a time of 1:23.805. That bounced Hulkenberg out of Q3 by the tiny margin of two hundredths of a second, with Sainz another two hundredths of a second further back. Perez qualified in P13 ahead of Maldonado and Alonso.

After the first runs of Q3 it was Hamilton who had the advantage. Rosberg was first on the road and set a lap of 1:22.766. Hamilton took a chunk out of that time in the first sector, running two tenths quicker than his team-mate and the pattern continued across the lap as he edged the German in all areas to post a time 0.358 quicker than Rosberg’s.

Behind them Vettel was third, over half a second adrift of Hamilton, with Ricciardo fourth ahead of Räikkönen, Bottas, Kvyat, Felipe Massa and Grosjean. Verstappen, though, opted to sit out the initial runs.

And in the end, the final runs followed the template set out in the first. Rosberg began with a flourish, recording a session-quickest S1 time, but his lap was less surefooted thereafter and although he improve on his first run, his time of 1:22:595 wasn’t good enough to dislodge Hamilton.

Behind him, the title leader was on a march and eventually he crossed the line in a time of 1:22.408 to beat dismiss his team-mate by 0.575s.

Vettel was third, almost seven tenths down on Hamilton, with Ricciardo fourth. Räikkönen was fifth ahead of Bottas with Kvyat seventh. Massa was eighth, while Verstappen’s sole run netted him ninth place. The final top ten spot went to Grosjean.

Hungarian Grand Prix, Qualifying – Saturday, 25 July 2015

Pos.	No.	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2	Q3	Laps
1	44	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:22.890	1:22.285	1:22.020	20
2	6	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:22.979	1:22.775	1:22.595	21
3	5	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:23.312	1:23.168	1:22.739	17
4	3	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull	1:24.408	1:23.230	1:22.774	20
5	7	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	1:23.596	1:23.460	1:23.020	16
6	77	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:23.649	1:23.555	1:23.222	19
7	26	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull	1:23.587	1:23.597	1:23.332	17
8	19	Felipe Massa	Williams	1:23.895	1:23.598	1:23.537	20
9	33	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso	1:24.032	1:23.781	1:23.679	18
10	8	Romain Grosjean	Lotus	1:24.242	1:23.805	1:24.181	18
11	27	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India	1:24.115	1:23.826		13
12	55	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso	1:24.623	1:23.869		16
13	11	Sergio Perez	Force India	1:24.444	1:24.461		14
14	13	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus	1:23.895	1:24.609		12
15	14	Fernando Alonso	McLaren	1:24.563			7
16	22	Jenson Button	McLaren	1:24.739			8
17	9	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	1:24.843			8
18	12	Felipe Nasr	Sauber	1:24.997			8
19	98	Roberto Merhi	Marussia	1:27.416			8
20	28	Will Stevens	Marussia	1:27.949			6