Formula 1 Pirelli Magyar Nagydij 2015

Hungarian Grand Prix Budapest, 26 July 2015

Posted: 26.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Maurizio Arrivabene: “A fantastic win! Over the past few weeks, we had had comments from people who said we were in a slump­, people who obviously can’t or don’t want to read the numbers. As a matter of fact, we had anticipated long time ago that there could be ups and down in the course of the season,  but that does not mean that we were stepping back. This weekend started with a horrible Friday for us, so we knew we only had P3 on Saturday to properly set the car up. We calmed down and managed to recover, but still we didn’t know we could win the race. We were only confident that we could fight at the front. Then both Seb and Kimi had a tremendous start and being able to drive in clean air surely made a difference in terms of tyre management, as we knew the first two sets of Options would perform very well. I am very disappointed, though, that Kimi din not make it to the end, because he was having a great day. Congrats to him. This is Formula One and we must accept the lack of reliability as another challenge for the future. We won today, but still keep our feet on the ground and remain humble and committed”.

Kimi Raikkonen: “It’s a shame what happened today in the race, but when you have no luck you have no luck, we did our best today. The start was really good for both of us, probably the best since the beginning of the season; we had good speed and were able to pull away and stay in front. The speed was always there today and I was expecting to push right to the end, but at one point I heard something strange in the car, the sound was getting different and then got worse and worse. We tried to fix it but it was not possible so I decided to retire. As a  team we had a pretty good day with Sebastian’s win, but I think that  we deserved a better result today, more than just a win. Without my problem we could have got a one-two finish very easily but things seem to always go in the worst possible way. Overall in the first part of the season we had the speed but it has been a bit unlucky. There was always something dictating the final result of the race quite badly. The most important thing now is to get rid of all the problems, we’ll  keep pushing and hopefully luck will turn on our side and we’ll get what we deserve.”

Sebastian Vettel: “It has been a week with a lot of ups and downs and as I said after the race I dedicate  this win to Jules and his family. The race was difficult especially at the end with all the thoughts coming through my mind but for sure I’m very happy with the result. Our race was very strong from the beginning, we had a great start and after that we had great pace and were able to control the race. Of course the safety car in the end was not helping us, but we still managed to stay on top and win the Grand Prix. It was fantastic to see all the guys of the team around as I looked down from  the podium, they were all very happy. Today we proved that the pace we showed has nothing to do with luck. In fact, if anything we were a bit unlucky with the safety  car, but our pace on the Prime tyre was really good so we kept pushing  and still  managed to come out on top and never allowed the people behind to come into the range of DRS. For sure it was a great race from all the guys and a great recovery from Friday, especially after we had heard strange rumours about the team facing a crisis… Thanks to all our partners for their support and to Shell for helping us with more power”.

Hungarian GP, Sergio Marchionne

Posted: 26.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

“A win dedicated to Jules Bianchi”

Maranello, 26 July 2015 – “We dedicate this victory to the memory of Jules Bianchi, a fantastic guy whom we all miss terribly,” said Ferrari Chairman Sergio Marchionne, following Sebastian Vettel’s win in the Hungarian Grand Prix. “Unfortunately, today in the end, we were unable to celebrate a one-two finish which was within our grasp because of a problem with Kimi’s car. That’s a clear sign we must never drop our guard. We will continue to work on closing the gap to those ahead of us, but without ever ignoring the reliability factor. We will soon be pausing for the summer break, after which I’m sure everyone in the Scuderia will return even more ready and determined than ever.”

This is for you Jules”

Posted: 26.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Scuderia Ferrari dominates the Hungarian Grand Prix with a win for Sebastian Vettel. An unlucky race for Kimi Raikkonen

Budapest, 26 July – A 69 lap charge around the Hungaroring ended in a win for Sebastian Vettel. The German took the lead right after the start, with a forceful move on the Mercedes duo of Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton. Vettel saw his 30 second advantage wiped out when the Safety Car came out on lap 42. Seb kept his concentration, doing a good job of managing the final third of the race, to take the chequered flag in first place for his second win with Ferrari, his first ever in Hungary.

Kimi Raikkonen was very unlucky today. The Finn was lying second for much of the race, thanks to a great start and a determined overtaking move on Rosberg under braking for Turn 2. Kimi was right behind his team-mate for two thirds of the race, but his chance of a podium evaporated on lap 56 when a problem with his energy recovery system meant he had to retire.

Hungarian Grand Prix – Budapest, 25 July 2015

Posted: 25.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Kimi Raikkonen: “It was a pretty normal qualifying, but we did not get the ideal result. We had some difficulties here and there and did not manage to put a very good lap together. This morning we had some issues and could not run with the soft tyres: for sure this did not help and it was a bit of unknown for qualifying, but it was not too bad and the behavior of the car was pretty good. Tomorrow I’ll be on the clean side of the starting grid, we’ll try to make a good start and see what happens in the first few corners. The race will be very long and obviously the Mercedes will be very strong, but if we cannot challenge them we’ll try to be second best. We’ll keep pushing and do our best.”

Sebastian Vettel: “We had a great recovery from a bad day yesterday. For sure it was not easy to catch up, but all in all I’m proud that we stayed calm, improved the car and had a good turnaround from yesterday, with an optimum result. We know it will be tight tomorrow, but we’ll give our maximum. Remaining realistic, Mercedes is very strong and it would be very tough to beat them, but we also have to look behind us, at teams like Red Bull and Williams which are very strong. Red Bull in particular had a very good Friday but we still managed to outqualify them today, which showed that we are quicker.”

Hungarian Grand Prix – Seb third, third row for Kimi

Posted: 25.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

The Scuderia’s SF15-T both in top 5 in Hungaroring qualifying

Budapest, 25 July –In torrid conditions at the Hungaroring, where the air temperature hit 33 degrees, the track on 55, qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix went well for Scuderia Ferrari. Sebastian Vettel was third fastest with a 1.22.739. Kimi Raikkonen was always a front runner, ending up fifth in 1.23.020. Pole position went to Lewis Hamilton who did a 1.22.020 in his Mercedes to finish just ahead of his team-mate Nico Rosberg (1.22.595.)

Hungarian Grand Prix – Seb first of the rest

Posted: 25.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Vettel third in FP3, spot of bother for Kimi

Budapest, 25 July – Sebastian Vettel took his Ferrari to third place in the final free practice session for the Hungarian Grand Prix with a lap in 1.23.886. Ahead of the German’s SF15-T were the Mercedes duo of Lewis Hamilton (1.22.997) and Nico Rosberg (1.23.095.) In the other Ferrari Kimi Raikkonen was sixteenth with a 1.25.661, having had to spend time in the pits following a loss of hydraulic pressure. The Finn only did 12 laps on the Medium tyres in the last session prior to qualifying, while his team-mate managed 19, doing his final run on the softer compound.

Hungarian Grand Prix – Budapest, 24 July 2015

Posted: 24.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Kimi Raikkonen: “It was not a very clean day, in fact it was a slightly different Friday than normal. We had some issues and missed some running, but we were more or less able to follow our program. The feeling with the car was not too bad and the tyres were behaving pretty ok, but the laptimes are still not right. I don’t know exactly what happened with my front wing, it just broke suddenly and came off damaging the tyre. The team is looking into it and hopefully they will find out the reason. Today it was only Friday, we had been trying many different things to see where we are. I think we can improve for tomorrow and find a bit more speed for the rest of the weekend.”

Sebastian Vettel: “Well, all in all we didn’t have the best day. There were two or three things that slowed us down and cost us some time. We were stuck in the garage this morning with a shortage in the electric system, and this afternoon Kimi had a problem with the front wing, so we both couldn’t run as much as we wanted. Now there is a lot to clean up, but for tomorrow we should do well and have a decent qualifying. Concerning Red Bulls performance, it was a bit expected but it is Friday and you don’t know what people are doing with their fuel loads, still you could see already in Silverstone that they did a step forward. We didn’t get into the rhythm today, now we need to sort out things for tomorrow, then we should have a much smoother weekend.”

Hungarian Grand Prix – An exploratory Friday

Posted: 24.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Ferraris fifth and seventh fastest in FP2

Hungaroring, 24 July – Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel finished fifth and seventh fastest respectively in their SF15-Ts in the second free practice session for the Hungarian Grand Prix on this first day of track action.
Raikkonen completed 30 laps, the quickest in 1.25.134, while Vettel did 26. Both men worked on set-up and car balance. They ran both Pirelli compounds, Medium and Soft on the scorching hot Hungarian track, with temperatures hitting the 53 degree mark. Having been quickest in the morning, Lewis Hamilton topped the time sheet again for Mercedes in 1.23.949. Behind him came the Red Bulls of Danil Kvyat (1.24.300_ and Daniel Ricciardo (1.24.451.)

Hungarian Grand Prix – A busy morning

Posted: 24.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Kimi third and Sebastian sixth in first Free Practice

Hungaroring, 24 July –The Ferraris ended the first free practice session for the Hungarian Grand Prix, which sees the Formula 1 World Championship up and running again after a three week break, this time at the twisty track on the outskirts of Budapest. Quickest was the Mercedes duo of Lewis Hamilton (1.25.141) and Nico Rosberg (1.25.250,) ahead of Raikkonen in the SF15-T (1.25.812.) On his final lap, the Finn lost the front wing after going over a kerb. Vettel set the sixth fastest time having spent a good part of the session in the pits with an electrical problem that manifested itself on the installation lap. He got back on track, completing 14 laps with a best in 1.26.395.

Hungarian Grand Prix – “Shaping up in the background”

Posted: 23.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Seb reckons progress is not always visible

Halfway through the season here’s my recap: I think we had a very strong start, obviously it was fantastic being on the podium at the first race, my first race with Ferrari, and the first win at the second races was phenomenal, but also after that I think we were able to be very consistent, we got a lot of podium finishes. We knew from the beginning of the season that there is a team that is very difficult to beat. Overall it was very positive, especially considering the fact that we are starting to shape up in the background, which obviously you don’t see here and you don’t see immediately on the car. It’s very promising, I think the project is ongoing, I’m quite confident for the future. I think Ferrari has done a big step out of all the teams, I don’t know why it’s so difficult to appreciate. Inside the team we are very proud, very happy of what has been achieved. We always try to win a race and if I could choose a second one that would be Monza. Obviously with the competition that we have with Mercedes being so strong is not that easy, we have to be patient. It’s already a miracle what we have achieved . This circuit potentially has the chance to favor the rest of the pack a bit more than others, maybe because it’s a short track, but we still need to extract a perfect weekend to be in a position to benefit from circustamnces or attack Mercedes.

Hungarian Grand Prix – “We need to clean it up”

Posted: 23.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Kimi recaps the first half of the season

Compared to last year, the first part of the season has not been ideal but not a disaster, even if we did not get the results we wanted for many different reasons.
We have the speed and everything to do better results, the feeling with the car is good but we keep having mistakes or issues here and there and this cost us a lot of points. As a team we want to be fast and more consistently in the front, to really challenge the Mercedes. I’m sure if we can clean up things and get rid of all the issues we can do a good job and get much better results. It’s hard to say how far is Mercedes still ahead, it seems to vary from circuit to circuit and different conditions. We know there’s still a lot of work to be done but I think we’re going in the good direction. It was a very sad thing to lose Jules, and the circumstances of his accident made it even sadder. Motorsport is dangerous sport and things can go easily wrong , we all know but we never expect these things to happen. I send my condolences to his Family.

Hungarian Grand Prix – Esteban: “heat plays a key role”

Posted: 22.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

Gutierrez’s view

Maranello, 22 July –Scuderia Ferrari’s third driver, Esteban Gutiérrez, describes the salient points of the Hungarian circuit to ferrari.com. “In Budapest, we usually encounter high temperatures and this factor has to be born in mind, because it can cause the tyres to overheat excessively. It’s a demanding circuit because the track surface is quite bumpy and many of the corners run together. For example, in the second sector, there are several corners following each other in quick succession, starting with turn 5, immediately followed by 6, then there’s a chicane and it goes on from there all the way to turn 12 without a break. While you’re driving you have to think not only about tackling the corners, but you must also ensure you don’t overheat the tyres too much, otherwise driving the rest of the circuit becomes a real nightmare. All the same, it’s a track I like a lot, where I have won quite often in other categories. When we get to Budapest, we also know this is the final Grand Prix before the summer break and that usually makes for a positive atmosphere.”

Hungarian GP – A lap of the track with Sebastian Vettel

Posted: 21.07.2015
Source: Ferrari

A circuit that rises and falls

Maranello, 21 July –Ferrari.com has found itself the ideal guide to describe a perfect lap of the Hungaroring. “This track features a lot of gradient changes,” says Sebastian Vettel “and it’s very important to keep to the right line. After Turn 1, which is very tight, you drop down towards the second corner, which requires heavy downhill braking. Next comes Turn 3, which is very quick and leads to a blind corner, number 4 and you have to carry your speed all the way to the next corner. After a short straight, you have to brake again, before the chicane that leads to turns 6 and 7. Then you come to one of my favourite parts of the track, because there’s barely time to breathe. “Turns 8 and 9 are actually very flowing and so it’s vital to have a good car set-up so as to control it. The next right hander, 10, leads to the quickest turn on the track, number 11. You can catch your breath again at Turn 12, when you also have time to change a few settings on the steering wheel. At Turn 13, the apex is right on the inside kerb and then we come to the final two quick corners. Once again, you have to be careful on the throttle, otherwise you risk spinning the rear wheels, especially when you get to the final corner, which is one of the longest on the Formula 1 calendar and really seems to be never ending. You have to try not to scrub off any of the speed you’ve built up in order to tackle the start-finish straight.”