Grand Prix of Hungary-An Amazing Display of True Grand Prix Maste

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Grand Prix of Hungary-An Amazing Display of True Grand Prix Maste

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To those on the outside looking in at the beautiful and sometimes mysterious world of Formula One Grand Prix racing, it sometimes takes a ‘Battle Royale’ for the casual fan of Motorsports to actually appreciate what is happening.

The Grand Prix of Hungary brought out the UFC fighters of the auto-racing world. Those said fighters operate at speeds and reaction times that we as mere mortals can never replicate. That’s why we watch such displays as we saw yesterday in Hungary with a sense of awe. Jenson Button, the winner for McLaren, was brilliant.

By far this race showed just how close the top teams are in performance to one another. McLaren, Red Bull and the iconic Scuderia Ferrari showed that they all are brilliant, all are fearless and all very human. All four top finishers are World Champions.

Mistakes were made in the tires selections during pit-stops as the team engineers did their utmost to play weathermen with rain showers and unforeseen mechanical issues. What’s the big story here? Sebastian Vettel, with Red Bull, will win the World Championship, but he is clearly rattled. Lewis Hamilton of Great Britain made passes on this young genius that no one thought were possible. Hamilton freely admits that he takes the car beyond what the engineers say it can do. Chalk one up for humans and take a star away from artificial intelligence.

In Grand Prix racing the cars start the race from a dead stop, all in a double row with acceleration that is almost incomprehensible to the normal driver. When the starting lights go out these cars go from a dead stop to 62 MPH in 1.9 seconds.

When the Hugarian race began, Lewis Hamilton, a master of the standing start, arrived at the first turn with Sebastian Vettel along side. What ensued was nothing short of two F-22 Raptors fighting for the same air space. Vettel ultimately slid off the track just long enough for Hamilton to rocket off in what appeared to be the drive of his life. Things change quickly in a Formula One race and change they did.

On lap 47 rain showers hit causing the teams to scramble for an answer. Would the rain blow over or would they need to come in for intermediate rain tires? Several teams chose the latter which was their undoing – the rain quit as quickly as it came. Those who were on the intermediate tires had to come back in and change to either the super soft or the prime tires, an extra pit stop, which was proved to be costly to Hamilton. Hamilton spun in the chicane but re-entered the track directly across the bow of Paul di Resta, of Scotland, triggering a penalty against the British World Champion.

While this battle raged on Jenson Button, in his 200th Grand Prix, took the lead ahead of Sebastian Vettel. Button is widely known for being incredibly smooth in his driving style and therefore easier on his tires than most. Once Button had the lead Vettel tried his utmost to get to him but to no avail. Jenson Button won one the most exciting Formula One races in recent memory. Coming second was Sebastian Vettel of Germany and then the fearless Spaniard, Fernando Alonso, in his Ferrari.

Formula One is one of those sports that to Americans is still perplexing to some degree, however, in 2012 the United States Grand Prix will return to Austin, Texas-a seemingly unlikely city -but the start of a trend that the manufacturers who own the teams or supply the technology desperately want to have on their International schedule. In fact, they want two. Maybe the United States is important after all.

RACE RESULTS

The Hungarian Grand Prix

The Hungaroring, Hungary;

70 laps; 306.663km;

Weather: Mixed conditions.

Classified:

Pos Driver Team Time

1. Button McLaren-Mercedes 1h43:42.337

2. Vettel Red Bull-Renault + 3.588

3. Alonso Ferrari + 19.819

4. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes + 48.338

5. Webber Red Bull-Renault + 49.742

6. Massa Ferrari + 1:17.176

7. Di Resta Force India-Mercedes + 1 lap

8. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap

9. Rosberg Mercedes + 1 lap

10. Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari + 1 lap

11. Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari + 1 lap

12. Petrov Renault + 1 lap

13. Barrichello Williams-Cosworth + 2 laps

14. Sutil Force India-Mercedes + 2 laps

15. Perez Sauber-Ferrari + 2 laps

16. Maldonado Williams-Cosworth + 2 laps

17. Glock Virgin-Cosworth + 4 laps

18. Ricciardo HRT-Cosworth + 4 laps

19. D'Ambrosio Virgin-Cosworth + 5 laps

20. Liuzzi HRT-Cosworth + 5 laps

Fastest lap: Massa, 1:23.415

Not classified/retirements:

Driver Team On lap

Kovalainen Lotus-Renault 56

Schumacher Mercedes 27

Heidfeld Renault 24

Trulli Lotus-Renault 18

World Championship standings, round 11:

Drivers: Constructors:

1. Vettel 234 1. Red Bull-Renault 383

2. Webber 149 2. McLaren-Mercedes 280

3. Hamilton 146 3. Ferrari 215

4. Alonso 145 4. Mercedes 80

5. Button 134 5. Renault 66

6. Massa 70 6. Sauber-Ferrari 35

7. Rosberg 48 7. Force India-Mercedes 26

8. Heidfeld 34 8. Toro Rosso-Ferrari 22

9. Schumacher 32 9. Williams-Cosworth 4

10. Petrov 32

11. Kobayashi 27

12. Sutil 18

13. Buemi 12

14. Alguersuari 10

15. Di Resta 8

16. Perez 8

17. Barrichello 4    

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