Hungarian Grand Prix: Qualifying Recap

While a wet final practice was meant to be a precursor to qualifying on Saturday, overhead conditions cleared up by the start of Q1 and a cloudy, but ultimately dry session meant weather would not be a factor in determining the grid for Sunday’s 70-lap race. Q1 proved straightforward for both Haas F1 entries on the Pirelli P Zero Red soft tires – Magnussen advancing into Q2 running the upgraded package on his VF-22. The Dane set a best lap of 1:18.993 for P12. Schumacher advanced with his fastest lap of 1:19.164 securing P14 at the checkered.

Q2 started with a short run on scrubbed softs for both Magnussen and Schumacher. A return to the garage and a switch onto brand new soft tires produced each driver’s fastest laps. Magnussen delivered a best effort of 1:18.825 to finish his qualifying session in P13. Schumacher nailed his fastest time on his final lap in Q2 – the German clocking a 1:19.202 for P15.

Britain’s George Russell secured his maiden Formula 1 pole position – the Mercedes driver topping Q3 with a 1:17.377 ahead of Scuderia Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz on a 1:17.421.

Kevin Magnussen, Driver No. 20, Haas F1 Team

“You always want to make Q3 and it wasn’t one of our best qualifying sessions but it seems this weekend we’ve been a little bit less competitive. There’s a lot of work going into it but it’s one of those things that will take time to extract the most out of it. From P13, I think you can fight for points. The pace looked alright on the long run, certainly the car felt good in FP2 with high-fuel, if anything a little bit better than low-fuel. We’ll take what we can tomorrow and go and have some fun.”

Mick Schumacher, Driver No. 47, Haas F1 Team

“It was tougher than what I would’ve hoped for. It was quite a chaotic sequence of laps but on the other hand it’s qualifying, and you’ve got to try some stuff, and with the upgrade package the gap was a bit bigger than what we wanted it to be. Our car isn’t bad, we still have the opportunity to go forwards and how far forwards is the question. If there’s a race from start to finish with no safety cars, maybe it will be a bit difficult to overtake, but we’ll give it a shot.”

 

Guenther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1 Team

“It was a medium qualifying session today. In FP3 with the rain, it was neither here nor there, so no conclusion can be taken from there. In qualifying, it wasn’t perfect but still if we have good starts like we had in France, we can still go for points. We got out of Q1 pretty well, but we just didn’t have the speed to get into Q3. We’re focused now on tomorrow, we’ll hopefully get a good start as we normally do and try to put ourselves in the position to score points. We’re here to fight and tomorrow that’s what we’ll be doing.”

 

Today's Data

Event: Qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix – Saturday July 30
Location: Hungaroring, Budapest
Layout: 4.381-kilometer (2.722-mile), 14-turn circuit
Weather: Mostly Cloudy
Air Temps: 21.8 degrees Celsius (71.2 degrees Fahrenheit)
Track Temps: 26 degrees Celsius (78.8 degrees Fahrenheit)
Team Result: Kevin Magnussen qualified 13th, Mick Schumacher qualified 15th 

Free Practice 3 Rundown:

Magnussen: 10th overall (1:44.655), 20 laps completed
Schumacher: 12th overall (1:45.156), 18 laps completed
Fastest: Nicholas Latifi of Williams (1:41.480)

Q1 Qualifying: 18-mins with all 20 drivers – Top 15 advance to Q2

Magnussen: 12th overall (1:18.993) – Advanced to Q2
Schumacher: 14th overall (1:19.164) – Advanced to Q2
Fastest: Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes (1:18.374)

Q2 Qualifying: 15-mins – Top 10 advance to Q3

Magnussen: 13th overall (1:18.825) 
Schumacher: 15th overall (1:19.202) 
Fastest: Max Verstappen of Red Bull Racing (1:17.703) 

Q3 Qualifying: 12-mins featuring the Top 10 

Pole Winner: George Russell of Mercedes (1:17.377)