Ricciardo wins in Hungaryposted in F127 | 07 | 2014

    AUSSIE DANIEL RICCIARDO made two dazzling overtaking moves over the closing laps to win a thrilling Hungarian Grand Prix. The Red Bull ace relegated Fernando Alonso's Ferrari back to second, and the Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton to third. World championship leader Nico Rosberg was fourth.

    Alonso had looked on course to end a 15-month victory drought for Ferrari, but the Spaniard's car finally struggled for pace towards the end of mammoth 32-lap final stint on a set of soft Pirelli tyres.

    But much of the attention focused on Hamilton. Having started from the pitlane, the former world champ survived a brush with the barrier after spinning at Turn 2 on the first lap.

    After battling his way through the field, Mercedes then controversially asked Hamilton to to let Rosberg overtake him midway through his final stint.

    The Englishman ignored the requests, famously replying over the team radio: "I'm not slowing down for Nico."

    And despite struggling over the closing two or three laps on a well-worn set of medium tyres, Hamilton held on to reduce the gap in the title race from 18 to 11 points as the teams head into the mid-season break.

    Related: Rosberg wins, but Hamilton delivers

    Polesitter Rosberg had dominated the opening laps on a Hungaroring track left wet by a downpour minutes before the start of the race.

    But the top three — Rosberg, Williams' Valtteri Bottas, Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel — plus Alonso, all had to wait an extra lap before pitting for dry tyres when Marcus Ericsson crashed heavily exiting Turn 3 on lap nine, bringing out the safety car.

    Mysteriously, at the first round of pitstops, with the track clearly drying and all the other teams opting for slicks, McLaren gambled on more rain coming and fitted new Intermediates to Jenson Button's car.

    Team-mate Kevin Magnussen stuck with his original set of inters, but when the rain didn't return, both drivers were forced to pit for slicks, with McLaren bosses blaming its satellite system for the "wrong call".

    The safety car made another appearance after Sergio Perez speared his Force India into the concrete pitfall on the start/finish straight after his left-rear wheel spun on the wet astroturf exiting the final corner.

    While Bottas fought back to eighth, after dropping into the pack after the first appearance of the safety car, Williams team-mate Felipe Massa finished fifth after struggling with his medium compound Pirellis in the final stint.

    Behind the Brazilian, Finn Kimi Raikkonen scored his best result since returning to Ferrari this season by rising from 16th on the grid to sixth.

    Seventh went to Vettel, who ruined his race with a spin similar to that of Perez. But while the Force India clattered the wall, the world champ's Red Bull spun 360-degrees, kissed the wall with his right-rear wheel and was able to continue.

    The top 10 was rounded off by the Toro Rosso of Jean-Eric Vergne, and Button, who recovered to finish 10th.

    DRIVERS' QUOTES:

    Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull:

    “Winning this today, it honestly feels as good as the first. It sank in a lot quicker this one, so crossing the line today I knew what was going on a bit more and it’s like I could enjoy it immediately rather than it being delayed, it was awesome. To have to pass guys again to win the race, as I did in Canada, makes it a lot more satisfying, knowing that we did have a bit of a fight on our hands – you beauty!

    "In this environment now I feel, I am a different driver and in a way a different person, a different sportsman than I was last year. I’ve got a lot more belief in myself and it’s cool, I definitely feel like I belong here now and I’ve got confidence; obviously we’ve converted two races into wins this year so far and I think that confidence is showing.

    "I’ve got some friends from Australia here this weekend, so the plan was to always have a few drinks tonight, so I think we’ve got an excuse to now!”

    Fernando Alonso, Ferrari:

    “This podium means a lot to me and the whole team, because after so many difficult races, we managed to get the most out of everything, also taking a few risks and second place seems like a win. To do 31 laps at the end on used Soft tyres was a great challenge.

    "At that point, the strategy suggested that if we had made a third stop, we could have finished fourth, but we decided to run to the flag instead. This race shows that anything is possible when there are unusual conditions like today, with a wet start and the appearance of the Safety Car.

    "We managed to make the most of all opportunities that presented themselves, taking the best decisions even at the most difficult moments. Sure, the characteristics of the circuit, with its limited overtaking opportunities, helped us and that’s why we have to be realistic and continue to work on the car, to improve in all aspects.”

    Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes:

    “It is a great result today; I was just pushing as hard as possible to get as high as I could. It was obviously damage limitation after what happened yesterday. I can't express the pain I feel when we have issues such as in the last couple of races; it's hard to swallow and difficult to come back the next day and get the right balance between not attacking too much, but pushing to the limit. The two safety car periods helped quite a lot, but naturally I looked fast and had the pace this weekend, so there was an opportunity for more points.

    "I was in the same race as Nico and if I let him past and he had the opportunity to pull away, then he would have come back and overtaken me. I didn't understand why the team asked me to do that as he didn't get close enough to overtake and I didn't want to lift off and lose ground to Fernando.

    "I would like to say a big congratulations to Daniel and Fernando. It was close at the end and it was getting very hard to keep Nico behind as he was catching at close to 3 seconds a lap. Coming back through shows how great this car and team is, and this result is much more satisfying than an easy win. Going into the break, I'm still in the fight for the championship, which is very satisfying.”

    Nico Rosberg, Mercedes:

    “That was a disappointing afternoon. A few things didn't work out for me and it was a very up and down race. In the beginning it was all under control. Unfortunately the safety car cost me the lead, because I just missed the pit entry and then I couldn't pit. I also had some braking issues after the safety car went in and a difficult period of time with handling this, which cost me some positions.

    "Then I was able to push a lot. I had a great last stint and at the end there was one chance to overtake Lewis in the last lap, but it didn't work out. So that is massively disappointing. We need to sit down and analyse internally what went wrong today. I'm still leading the championship, which is a positive thing, and I'll be ready to attack again after the summer break.”

    Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari:

    “Today’s race was difficult, but much more fun than the others, as I had a good feeling with the car, the pace was good and I felt I could push. After the way qualifying went yesterday, sixth was the most we could hope for. At the start, I got away well but then I lost vital time behind a Sauber and when I caught Massa’s Williams, I couldn’t get past: here in general, overtaking is not easy and we lack speed down the straights.

    "Sure, this is a good team result, but we must not get too excited, because even if there are signs of improvement, we still have much work to do in a lot of areas to get to where we want to be. We’ve had a very complicated start to the season, but I hope the second part of the championship will go better. I have great faith in the team and I feel we are going in the right direction. Even if it's going to take some time, I’m sure the results will come.”

    Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull:

    “It wasn’t a great race. I spun, which was my mistake, and before that I was unlucky with the safety car in the first stint. The timing meant the first four cars lost positions to those running behind. Unfortunately we were then in the wrong mode for the restart and I lost two positions. It’s good for Daniel that he won today, I’m happy for him.”

    Jenson Button, McLaren:

    “I’m glad it was an exciting race for the fans, but it was a tough afternoon for us. We didn’t make the right decisions today. The opening laps in the rain were great: I got up into fifth – which wasn’t a bad position for us – but it went downhill from there. As the track started to dry, we thought it was going to rain again – unfortunately, however, we were the only ones thinking that.

    "I feel like I did everything right, and in every track condition, which is why it’s tough – but we win as a team and we lose as a team, and we’ll quickly put this behind us and move on.

    It’s the perfect time for the summer break – obviously, we’re not where we want to be, but we’ve had some positive results, and the whole team has worked incredibly hard throughout this first half of the season.

    "I hope that everybody can get the chance to recharge their batteries before we embark on what we hope will be a better half of the season.”

    F1 — Hungary Grand Prix, Budapest (Result):

    1. Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 1h53m05.058s;

    2. Fernando Alonso Ferrari +5.225s;

    3. Lewis Hamilton Mercedes +5.857s;

    4. Nico Rosberg Mercedes +6.361s;

    5. Felipe Massa Williams-Mercedes +29.841s;

    6. Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari +31.491s;

    7. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault +40.964s;

    8. Valtteri Bottas Williams-Mercedes +41.344s;

    9. Jean-Eric Vergne Toro Rosso-Renault +58.527s;

    10. Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes +1m07.280s;

    11. Adrian Sutil Sauber-Ferrari +1m08.169s;

    12. Kevin Magnussen McLaren-Mercedes +1m18.465s;

    13. Pastor Maldonado Lotus-Renault +1m24.024s;

    14. Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso-Renault -1 lap;

    15. Jules Bianchi Marussia-Ferrari -1 lap;

    16. Max Chilton Marussia-Ferrari -1 lap.

    Retirements:

    Esteban Gutierrez Sauber-Ferrari 33 laps

    Kamui Kobayashi Caterham-Renault 25 laps

    Sergio Perez Force India-Mercedes 23 laps

    Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 15 laps

    Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 11 laps

    Marcus Ericsson Caterham-Renault 8 laps

    Championship Standings:

    Drivers':

    1. Nico Rosberg 202

    2. Lewis Hamilton 191

    3. Daniel Ricciardo 131

    4. Fernando Alonso 115

    5. Valtteri Bottas 95

    6. Sebastian Vettel 88

    7. Nico Hulkenberg 69

    8. Jenson Button 60

    9. Felipe Massa 40

    10. Kevin Magnussen 37

    11. Sergio Perez 29

    12. Kimi Raikkonen 27

    13. Jean-Eric Vergne 11

    14. Romain Grosjean 8

    15. Daniil Kvyat 6

    16. Jules Bianchi 2

    17. Adrian Sutil 0

    18. Marcus Ericsson 0

    19. Pastor Maldonado 0

    20. Esteban Gutierrez 0

    21. Max Chilton 0

    22. Kamui Kobayashi 0

    Constructors':

    1. Mercedes 393

    2. Red Bull-Renault 219

    3. Ferrari 142

    4. Williams-Mercedes 135

    5. Force India-Mercedes 98

    6. McLaren-Mercedes 97

    7. Toro Rosso-Renault 17

    8. Lotus-Renault 8

    9. Marussia-Ferrari 2

    10. Sauber-Ferrari 0

    11. Caterham-Renault 0

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    Jim McGill

     

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