Great how everybody in McLaren is feeling shitty even though they have a 1-2. Oscar potentially feeling the win was underserved, Lando feeling that the team isn't backing him and engineers, strategists all feeling unnecessarily stressed and having to go through a heated debrief
If Piastri went first then there was a chance Hamilton would have undercut Norris
It was the right strategy call to pit Norris first to cover Hamilton.. and it was agreed beforehand that Norris will have to give the position back to Piastri
Today was by far the race with spiciest team radio. Norris and his team engineer, max and GP, Alex and his engineer, Alonso and Aston - DtS must rubbing their hands
They said they needed to cover Hamilton, but Hamilton wasn't that fast. Maybe Hamilton didn't try anymore to hold pace, still, there was a huge gap at the end of the race. Also a big enough gap at the time of "covering" for Hamilton. When they called in Norris it seemed like they wanted to give advantage an used an excuse. I don't get what they were really aiming for.
I'm so disappointed with Norris. I understand the ego, but he could have let Piastri go ahead with 20 laps to go, and he would have had plenty of time to overtake him after that. Instead, he produced this shitshow and finished second anyway.
I suspect team plan was not to fight. Whoever was ahead after the first round of stops would stay ahead unless pressured by other cars. So he knew if he let him past heโd be up being him the whole race.
Disappointed for Oscar, he deserved the win today but now it's gonna feel like it was given rather than earned. That being said, am really happy for him getting his first win on the board, and I'm sure it won't be the last for him, he's driving really well and the McLaren car is performing vs the competition at the moment.
I heard the commentary team say he's the only driver this season to be in every lap all season, which definitely doesn't hurt either.
Hungaroring proved again that it's not a great track for F1 as far as entertainment goes, but thankfully we were given generous helpings of drama from almost every team as compensation. And we did get a nice battle between Verstappen and Hamilton... at least until Max completely lost his head.
The race seemed primed for strategy battles, but not much exciting came of it. The early undercutters didn't really accomplish anything, the only thing of note I think was Yuki who managed to make the one-stop work and claimed two solid points off it. Perez actually pulled off a recovery drive up to 7th, too, which at this point is a surprising success. He was struggling to overtake slow cars early on, but starting on the hard tyre played in his favour here.
McLaren again really displaying the incompetence of their pitwall, which is so disheartening. Yes, Norris should have just checked his ego, but he shouldn't have been in that position to begin with. Really sullies what should have been a great day for the team, and I feel bad for Oscar as his first win comes with mixed emotions. He did really deserve it off his great start and first stint, but will he feel that way himself?
Don't have much to say about Max that hasn't been said already. It's amazing how fast the idea that he has matured fades as soon as he's no longer in vastly superior machinery. Turns out it's easy to be calm when you're 30 seconds ahead of 2nd and the old Max never left. Maybe this race was exacerbated by lack of sleep, but he was acting like a petulant child all race. Even GP sounded fed up with him, which is fairly rare.
Overall a great show if you like the soap opera side of F1. Lots of tension all over, lots of cracks showing. The biggest takeaway I think is that the Red Bull upgrade package once again failed to deliver the performance they were hoping for. Very interesting for the rest of the season with McLaren continuing to look like the best car out there. It's a shame they haven't been able to capitalise more on the past couple of months, but one DNF for Max and it could get sweaty for RBR...
Fernando was told to let Lance by to chase down Tsunoda, Lance was told to give the place back after failing to do so, and he didn't. Tbf though it was more of strategic blunder by the team.
Really disappointed by Max today. Yes the car was not the fastest and strategy was far from perfect but he did not maximise the race at all. This was almost like a pre 2020 max
I think they need to bring back the No Team Orders rule. Great race has been overshadowed by that call and finish. Let all the drivers race each other to show who is the better driver. Lando had it covered and Oscar had no response.