The Hungarian Grand Prix Redux

It was rather handy that the Hungarian Grand Prix was followed by the two-weekend summer break, for it's given us all a chance to catch our collective breath and reflect on what was one of the most remarkable races of recent years. Last week we looked at the ups and downs of Ferrari's weekend in Budapest, while Pat Symonds gave us an insight into how things unfolded at Renault.

But while it's always interesting to analyse how things went wrong for a particular team, it would be remiss not to take a closer look at how Jenson Button and Honda got it just right and put a couple of years of disappointment behind them. And just to balance things out, let's take a look at how things went awry for McLaren...

Honda's Day of Days

Honda (or BAR) have been criticised in the past for not making the right calls, and Jenson Button has taken some stick since it was reported (some time after the fact) that he should have beaten Ferrari and Michael Schumacher on occasion in 2004. But sometimes the team have got it just right, as at Spa last year, when Button chased Fernando Alonso home.

The Briton's prospects at Budapest did not exactly look good when he suffered yet another V8 failure on Saturday morning, inadvertently creating the red flag that led to Michael Schumacher's penalty. So he went into qualifying knowing he had a 10-place grid penalty. The upside, such as it was, was that he did at least have a fresh engine.

Aware that Alonso and Schumacher would also be tumbling down the order, the team decided on an aggressive strategy of trying to get him as far up the grid as possible, and then dealing with the limitations of the inevitable light fuel load come the race. With the title contenders absent from the top 10 run-off, he earned a respectable fourth, which then of course became 14th - behind Schumacher and just ahead of Alonso. In fact, the team were a little disappointed with the outcome.

"The cars handled well all weekend, under very different circumstances," team chief Nick Fry explained after the race. "On Friday, on a very green track, even though we suffered quite a lot of front tyre graining, the car still went quickly. Obviously the low point was the engine going. At that point we thought there's not much we can do from here. Jenson in fact before his engine penalty could have been on pole position.

"Frankly, he made a muck-up into the first corner, and lost three or four tenths. In fact it turned out later that we'd made a bit of a muck-up and put a bit too much fuel in the car. So he ended up with a bit more than we anticipated in the car. I think with the right amount of fuel and without the muck-up on the first corner, I think he would have been on pole."

Had it been a normal, dry race, his aim would have been to hook up with Schumacher and/or Alonso and, when the midfielders made space, follow them through. Of course, Sunday was anything but normal by Hungarian standards, and that opened up all sorts of possibilities. Button's first decision was to go for intermediate tyres (standard wets), when teammate Rubens Barrichello opted for extreme wets.

The Brazilian, always good in mixed conditions, was the only driver to take that option. It was a gamble that was to fail badly. Within five laps he had stopped for intermediates. There was a suggestion that he was flattered in qualifying by a very light fuel load, but it seems unlikely that he could have been that light.

Inevitably the dramatic progress made by Schumacher and Alonso on the first lap overshadowed anything Button did. He automatically gained a place when Christian Klien started from the pitlane, but lost one almost as quickly to Alonso. On a relatively cautious first lap, the 'only' drivers he passed were Mark Webber, Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher, all three struggling badly on unsuitable Bridgestone intermediates.

On the second lap, Button passed a spinning Robert Kubica, and also got by Nick Heidfeld. On the third lap, he got David Coulthard, and on the fourth, the floundering Felipe Massa. That put him seventh, but he wasn't done yet. Barrichello's stop at the end of lap five gifted him another place, and then on consecutive laps he took Giancarlo Fisichella and, the one he enjoyed most, Michael Schumacher. So here he was, seven laps in, having got up to fourth - and in effect recovered his grid position.

Button overtakes Michael Schumacher © LAT

"He said this morning it would have really hacked him off if he had been on pole and then gone back 10 places," said Fry. "We knew we were quick. The way he cut through 10 people ahead of him in seven laps was remarkable, and a vindication of his talent. People have so often said 'Jenson is a great driver, he's very smooth, but he's not aggressive'. When he overtook Michael Schumacher, I just smiled and said to myself, you showed 'em mate."

He was now 20 seconds down on leader Kimi Raikkonen, and 12 behind third-placed Alonso. The Spaniard had of course started behind Jenson, but remember, he had done most of the hard work on his inspired first lap.

For a while he was quicker than Alonso, but that was a little deceiving, as he was also a lot lighter. But he was certainly faster than Kimi, which was more relevant. That became clear when they both came in on lap 17, a lap after Pedro de la Rosa. Alonso, having had the freedom to fill up before the start, carried on in front, and Jenson's new target was de la Rosa, now third.

In fact at this stage of the race Pedro, with a little less fuel on board, began to pull away, while Jenson also lost ground to leader Alonso. Everything changed again when Raikkonen crashed with Tonio Liuzzi, bringing out the safety car. De la Rosa pitted but Button, like Alonso, did not.

Button was certainly flattered by the safety car, and anyone who thinks he might have beaten Alonso on merit should consider the fact that before the safety car, the Spaniard was 53.9 seconds up the road, and after the safety car came in, the gap was 8.8 seconds. Sure, Alonso was able to use the caution period to squeeze in his first stop, but he definitely lost more than he gained.

The status quo changed again as Button began to close that gap. He was certainly much lighter than Alonso, but also as the track dried it seemed to suit his tyres more - they were some 10 laps older than the world champion's. After the restart, on lap 32, the gap tumbled to nothing by lap 45. At that point, Button had no choice but to pit, as he was in need of fuel - he and Alonso were on completely different schedules.

His problem was that it wasn't quite dry enough for grooved tyres - just a few minutes earlier Scott Speed had made a disastrous change. So Button did exactly what he did at Spa last year, and stayed on the same heavily worn intermediates. On that occasion he used the same set of tyres from lap 12, through a stop on lap 33, and all the way to the flag. It worked superbly, and other teams took note of the speed of his near-slicks at the end.

Indeed in Hungary Robert Kubica tried the trick for BMW less than one minute before Button's stop, and Michael Schumacher did it seconds later. Within a couple of laps, dry-weather tyres were acceptable, so nobody else tried it.

The team knew Button would need another stop, so they gave him just enough fuel to get him well into the dry tyre window. In so doing they also ensured that he would stay ahead of de la Rosa.

"The guys made exactly the right calls," said Fry. "We knew the track was drying out, obviously, and he was going quicker and quicker on the intermediate tyres. It was remarkable the way they lasted. When he came in for the pitstop, when he actually stayed on the tyres, after he went out, the chief mechanic [Alistair Gibson] was asked what the tyres looked like, and he said they didn't look good! But they just kept going faster and faster and faster. We short filled him, and if we just gave him a small amount of fuel, he could just get out in front of de la Rosa. And he did."

Honda crew change Button to dry tyres © LAT

For a few laps, Button was significantly quicker than leader Alonso, and we now had this strange scenario where clearly the Spaniard could go straight to dries at his second and final stop, but in so doing would lose the lead to the Briton. However, with some 19 laps to go there was no way Button could survive on those tyres - and the fuel timings showed that he would need a splash and dash anyway.

Alonso was 14.5 seconds clear the lap before he pitted, but of course we never got to see how things might have panned out, as the Renault suffered a wheel nut failure and the Spaniard retired. Jenson was then so far clear of de la Rosa that he could make his extra stop, take on grooves, and get to the end still miles ahead. But there was still a lot to worry about back in the pits.

"Ten laps out, the chief mechanic said to the guys 'remain on standby, but please start praying'," said Fry. "I think they all must have prayed very hard and been good boys in a previous life maybe! Everyone was just completely focused and watching the screens, and as we got closer [to the end], the atmosphere got better and better.

"People don't believe these things until you cross the line. We've had so many disappointments, so there's always the risk that something goes wrong at the last minute or on the last lap. It didn't, we kept going and we kept going very fast. There was a great atmosphere in the pits, a lot of crying going on, and a lot of cheering."

It was a deserved win. Of course, Button was fortunate that Alonso retired, but he had everyone else beaten, and he certainly put Renault under pressure in that pitstop. A lot of people have had a lot more luck on the way to their first wins, and you can't ignore the fact that he completely destroyed Barrichello. Even after getting on to the right tyres, the Brazilian was rarely on Jenson's pace.

The wet conditions didn't hurt, nor that new-for-qualifying engine. It'll be interesting to see how it fares over the Turkey weekend. If it lasts the distance, I suspect it will be destined for the Honda museum...

Kimi's Nightmare Continues

McLaren might not be involved in the title battle, but they are desperately searching for a win, and Hungary saw an apparent opportunity slip away.

Everything looked good at the start when Kimi Raikkonen sailed off into the distance, and Pedro de la Rosa silenced a few sceptics by staying in touch. They both made relatively early pitstops, because they were locked into their dry qualifying fuel loads. But after the stops, which were unreasonably slow, Kimi's pace suddenly tailed off.

A combination of a front wing adjustment and a change of pressure for his second set of tyres meant that he suddenly suffered from a loss of temperature in the fronts, while a heavier fuel load than Pedro's added to his woes. Once again the team had dropped the ball, and the Finn had to suffer the consequences.

Vitantonio Liuzzi limps away from the crash that eliminated Kimi Raikkonen © LAT

We now had the unexpected situation of Raikkonen preparing to let his teammate through. McLaren's F1 CEO Martin Whitmarsh takes up the story: "At the first stops we made some adjustments to Kimi's car that in retrospect probably weren't the best, and I think he had difficulty with warming up his tyres on that second run, and he also was heavier on fuel than Pedro. So Pedro was catching him. Kimi was mindful of that, and was going to let Pedro through.

"There's a discussion about what was going on, and he was totally relaxed about it. He was told 'Pedro is coming up behind you, he's lighter', so he was about to do that when obviously they both came across [Tonio] Liuzzi.

"Liuzzi tried to let them through but slowed suddenly on the racing line, which is an unconventional manoeuvre, and in fairness it was probably difficult to come off the racing line. Kimi didn't expect that and had no way of avoiding it. It was pretty disappointing for Kimi, and it could easily have taken both our cars out. But Pedro managed to loop his way through and carry on."

Raikkonen admitted later that he had simply been looking in his mirrors, preparing to allow his teammate past, when he ran into Liuzzi. He put no blame on the Italian, and nor did the FIA after talking to the Finn, but nevertheless Liuzzi was not exactly exonerated by frustrated McLaren team members. He was all but on the grass as he tried to keep out of the way, and did just what the FIA tells drivers to do in tight spots between corners, which is slow down. How else can a rival sneak through?

The incident brought out the safety car, and the first man to come charging straight into the pits was de la Rosa. It seemed like the logical thing to do, but he had stopped only 10 laps earlier, so there was clearly an option to stay out. Had he done so, he would have been much higher in the queue for the restart - just behind leader Alonso and ahead of Button.

He would also have been much lighter than he was in reality at this stage of the race. It's impossible to say whether he could ultimately have beaten Button, but he certainly would have had a much better opportunity than he actually did.

"Frankly I think we didn't serve him well," said Whitmarsh. "In retrospect, perhaps we shouldn't have stopped, and when he did stop, we chucked a load of fuel on, so he was a very heavy car after that. The way the race panned out and we had to come in and change tyres anyway, it didn't serve him as well as it might have done.

"So my instinct is that we shouldn't have stopped, and had we stopped, we shouldn't have put so much fuel in, so we might have had a double whammy. I think we made those calls for the understandable reasons, and you don't know how the race will pan out, you don't know what other people are going to do, you can often not make those decisions by being indecisive.

"The fact is we were decisive. Pedro was very quick in informing us that the safety car boards were out, really before it had come up on the screens, so we really thought we were getting a jump in that way. We responded immediately to pull him in."

De la Rosa and Martin Whitmarsh © McLaren

Quite rightly, Honda and Jenson Button got all the plaudits, but this was a great day for a man who was written off a few years ago, and whose career seemed to be over when he was pushed out of Jaguar Racing at the end of 2002.

The above conversation with Whitmarsh ended when de la Rosa finally got back to the McLaren motorhome after his media commitments, and the two men had a big, tearful hug right in front of my eyes. Pedro got a standing ovation from all those present, and there was a genuine tide of emotion.

Second place doesn't normally mean much if you're McLaren, but this was very special. And de la Rosa had clearly made his case for that 2007 ride if Ron Dennis ultimately decides that Lewis Hamilton needs more time before he's put up against Alonso.

"Pedro is a very popular driver in our team and therefore we're absolutely delighted for him. It was a fantastic drive. For the team, there's a tinge of disappointment, to lose Kimi in that way, and let what should have been a win for us slip through our fingers.

"Overall I think it was a very competitive weekend for us, and that's positive. So, a mixture of emotions as there often is when you try to analyse the pluses and minuses that come out of a Grand Prix."