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BUDAPEST: Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton won the Hungarian Grand Prix for the eighth time to equal Michael Schumacher’s single-venue record and take the championship lead on Sunday.
Hamilton’s latest victory from pole position was as comfortable as the nearly nine-second margin over second-place Max Verstappen suggested. The British driver’s 86th GP win moved him just five behind the German great Schumacher’s F1 record of 91.
Schumacher won the French GP eight times when it was held at Magny-Cours. Hamilton first won here in 2007 and his first success with Mercedes also came at the Hungaroring track in 2013, the year after replacing Schumacher on the Silver Arrows team.
Verstappen drove superbly to hold off Hamilton’s Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas, who finished less than one second behind him in third to relinquish the championship lead after three races.
It was Hamilton’s second win this season, following victory at the Styrian Grand Prix a week earlier, and lifted him to the top of the drivers’ championship by a single point ahead of Bottas who won the opening Austrian Grand Prix.
“Round One was multiple different punches that I wasn’t ready for,” said Hamilton, referring to the defeat in the season opener. “But I have refocused and we’ve just been on point here right through the weekend.”
Hamilton took a record-extending 90th career pole on Saturday to match Schumacher’s record for seven poles on the 4.4-kilometre track nestled among rolling hills outside of Budapest.
He made a clean start but Bottas made a poor one from second and was overtaken by Lance Stroll starting third; the Ferraris of Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc, and Verstappen from seventh.
Red Bull only just managed to get Verstappen’s car on the grid for the start. About 20 minutes earlier, he damaged the front wing when going over a kerb and sliding into the barriers on a warmup lap.
Team principal Christian Horner looked on anxiously as mechanics replaced it and repaired the suspension, working frantically fast to get his car ready. They did, with just minutes left.
“It wasn’t how I wanted it, of course, but the mechanics did an amazing job to fix the car so to pay them back with second place is great,” said Verstappen.
In a demoralising sign of the times for Ferrari, both cars were lapped by Hamilton.
Stroll placed fourth ahead of Red Bull’s Alexander Albon, with Vettel sixth and Leclerc out of the points in 11th.
Sergio Perez was seventh in the second ‘pink Mercedes’ Racing Point ahead of Daniel Ricciardo of Renault, Kevin Magnussen of Haas and Carlos Sainz of McLaren.
Hamilton and most drivers again took the knee against racism before the start. AlphaTauri’s French driver Pierre Gasly was the only retirement of the race.