Lewis Hamilton Returns to the Top in Hungary

Lewis Hamilton Secures pole position in Hungary during qualifying today. The performance came in a dramatic set of qualifying sessions. Hamilton beat out Max Verstappen (Red Bull) by a margin of 0.003 seconds. The finish was Hamilton’s first pole position of the year and a record ninth at the Hungaroring. Hamilton set the lap on the very last lap of the session. All other cars had already completed their final lap and it came down to the wire. Hamilton stated the following to F1.com. “It’s been a crazy year and half, so I’ve lost my voice from shouting so much in the car. It’s amazing that feeling, I feel so grateful to be up here, because the team have worked so hard. We’ve been pushing so hard over this time, so to finally get a pole, it feels like the first time. I didn’t expect coming today that we would be fighting for pole. So, when I went into that last run, I gave it absolutely everything. There was nothing left in it.”

McLaren showed massive improvement securing a P3 and P4 finish in Q3 to lock out the second row. it is clear that the upgrades that McLaren brought to Hungary are working. In surprising fashion the Alpha Romeo of Guan Zhou Yu finished 5th fastest. It appears that the Alpha’s are making strides in the performance department. We will see if they can carry this early success into a result on race day.

Sergio Perez has finally returns to Q3 after missing out on Q3 in the last 5 races. He finished P9 well behing his teammate in P2 however we know that Perez is a master of overtaking and track position defense. It will be interesting to see how he bounces back tomorrow. Elsewhere on the grid, Daniel Ricciardo (Alpha Tauri) qualified P13 in his debut ahead of his teammate Yuki Tsunoda who finished P17. It is great to see Ricciardo jump back into action and compete. We will see if he can use this new found confidence to score points for Alpha Tauri for tomorrow.

Full Qualifying Results are Below