The Hungaroring was the setting for the 11th round of the 2011 season. The weekend saw a series of milestones for drivers and teams. It was the 100th Grand Prix for both Nico Rosberg of Mercedes and Toro Rosso. It was also the 200th race for Jenson Button. He started his career in 2000 with Williams, and has driven for Benetton, Renault, BAR, Honda and Brawn before moving to his current team McLaren. His first win came at this circuit, in 2006 for BAR, but his greatest moment is undoubtedly becoming World Champion in 2009 with Brawn. Jarno Trulli was back in his race seat at Lotus, after Karun Chandok had replaced him at the Nurburgring.
Even though he hadn’t won since Valencia, Sebastian Vettel still had a healthy lead in the championship. He was 77 points ahead of Red Bull team-mate, Mark Webber. The battle behind Vettel for the best-of-the-rest tag was tight, as Webber was only 5 points ahead of McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton, with Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso a further four points adrift. In the constructors’, championship, Red Bull were miles ahead with a 112-points cushion over nearest rivals McLaren. Ferrari were a further 51 points adrift, but were well clear in third place from Mercedes and Lotus.
2011 Hungarian Grand Prix
In both Friday practise sessions, Hamilton was on top. Alonso was third in FP1, and second in FP2. Both Red Bulls were off the pace in FP2, and their team worked overtime to improve the cars performance. It worked as Vettel topped the time-sheets in the final practise session, three tenths off second-fastest driver Alonso. Hamilton, who had been the man of the day on Friday, could only muster the seventh fastest time of the session.
There was no real shocks in Q1, as the Lotus, Virgin and HRT cars were the ones that were eliminated. Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Buemi qualified 18th, but due to his incident with Renault’s Nick Heidfeld in Germany, he was demoted to 23rd place for the race. In Q2, everyone used the option tyres, apart from Hamilton, who was still able to get into Q3 with the sixth fastest time. Both Renaults and Williams failed to make the cut. They were joined by Force India’s Paul di Resta, Sauber’s Kamui Kobayashi and Toro Rosso’s Jaime Alguersuari. In Q3, the Mercedes of Michael Schumacher and Sauber’s Sergio Perez decided to sit out the session to save their tyres. Red Bull, McLaren and Ferrari decided to do two qualifying stints. In the first stint, Hamilton was slightly ahead of Vettel. In the final stint, Vettel improved to take his first pole position here, with Hamilton less than two tenths behind. Button was less than five hundredths off his team-mate, with the Ferrari pair ahead of Webber.
Qualifying
1 Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull-Renault
2 Lewis Hamilton, McLaren-Mercedes
3 Jenson Button, McLaren-Mercedes
4 Felipe Massa, Ferrari
5 Fernando Alonso, Ferrari
6 Mark Webber, Red Bull-Renault
7 Nico Rosberg, Mercedes
8 Adrian Sutil Force India-Mercedes
9 Michael Schumacher, Mercedes
10 Sergio Pérez, Sauber-Ferrari
11 Paul di Resta, Force India-Mercedes
12 Vitaly Petrov, Renault
13 Kamui Kobayashi, Sauber-Ferrari
14 Nick Heidfeld, Renault
15 Rubens Barrichello, Williams-Cosworth
16 Jaime Alguersuari, Toro Rosso-Ferrari
17 Pastor Maldonado, Williams-Cosworth
18 Heikki Kovalainen, Lotus-Renault
19 Jarno Trulli, Lotus-Renault
20 Timo Glock, Virgin-Cosworth
21 Vitantonio Liuzzi, HRT-Cosworth
22 Daniel Ricciardo, HRT-Cosworth
23 Sébastien Beumi, Toro Rosso-Ferrari
24 Jérôme d’Ambrosio, Virgin-Cosworth
Variable weather conditions meant that the track was damp at the start of the race, which gave the added drama of what were the best tyres to be on. At the start, Vettel made a clean getaway, with the McLarens on his rear. Webber and the Ferrari pair, struggling in the conditions, dropped a few places. Rosberg and Schumacher were up to fourth and fifth respectively. Massa took seventh from Webber, and Alonso retook the position from Schumacher at the end of the first lap. Alonso got past Rosberg for fourth a few laps later, but then went wide at turn three, resulting in the German to regain the position. Hamilton was putting pressure on Vettel, and the German went off track at turn two, and lost the lead. Massa span off at the same place, damaging his rear wing and ended up down in ninth place. Alonso got past Rosberg at turn one, and this time was able to keep fourth position. Webber and Massa pitted for dry tyres on lap 10. Button came in on lap 11, with Hamilton and Vettel coming in a lap later. This resulted in Button getting his tyres warmed up quicker, as he had been out an extra lap, and he was able to make a move on Vettel at turn two to go up to second place.
Webber was making a charge as well, and took Alonso at turn two for fourth position. Trulli retired due to a water leak on lap 17. A cracked exhaust pipe resulted in Heidfeld’s car to catch fire just as he was coming out of the pits on lap 23, and he immediately retired and safely evacuated the burning vehicle. Massa was able to get alongside Schumacher, who had just come out of the pits, and the German lost control halfway through turn three., He had to retire shortly afterwards with a gearbox issue on lap 26. After Vettel’s third pit stop, he was able to close on Alonso, and pass him on the outside at turn one. The rain returned, and Hamilton span at turn eight, resulting in him losing the lead to Button. As he tired to return on track from his spin, he forced di Resta off the road. D’Ambrosio spun his car in the pit lane, and narrowly avoided his mechanics. The tricky conditions caught out Button and Vettel at turn two, and handed Hamilton back the lead of the race.
On lap 52, Button had recovered and was able to get past Hamilton at turn one, but Lewis regained the position back at turn two. Hamilton and Webber pitted for intermediate tyres, but it was the wrong choice as the dry tyres were performing better, and they had to pit again for the slicks. Hamilton then learnt he was getting a drive-through penalty for his earlier incident with di Resta. On lap 55, Kovalainen suffered the same fate as his team-mate, and retired due to a water leak. The battle for eighth place was between Kobayashi, Beumi, Alguersuari, Sutil and Perez. Beumi got past the Japanese driver at turn one, but when his team-mate tired to follow suit, he clipped the Sauber, and ended up in 13th place. Webber encountered a number of back-markers in the middle sector, and this gave Hamilton the opportunity to close up and get past the Australian at turn 12 for fourth place. Alonso, who had stayed out on the dry tyres, was able to finish third, behind Vettel and race winner Button.
Race
Position Driver Time Points
1 Button 1 hour, 46 minutes, 42.337 seconds 25
2 Vettel +3.588 18
3 Alonso +19.819 15
4 Hamilton +48.338 12
5 Webber +49.742 10
6 Massa +83.176 8
7 di Resta +1 Lap 6
8 Buemi +1 Lap 4
9 Rosberg +1 Lap 2
10 Alguersuari +1 Lap 1
Even though it was the third consecutive race that Vettel had fail to win, he still extended his championship lead to 89 points over his nearest rival. The battle of second was even tighter now, with just four points separating the trio of Webber, Hamilton and Alonso. The day belonged to Button though, as in his 200th Grand Prix, and the location of his maiden victory, he took his second win of the season, and 11th in his F1 career.
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