2024 Hungarian Grand Prix - Friday

Solid opening day of running in Budapest

• In sweltering heat, the team took to the track for the first day of running at the Hungaroring.
• Lewis and George ran the Medium and Soft compound in both sessions, forgoing the use of the Hard tyre.
• The focus of Friday was predominantly on the long run, with the team only briefly taking a look at single lap work on the Soft compound.
• With a track temperature closing on 60°C in FP1, George and Lewis ended the session in P4 and P10 but more importantly completing a long run on the Medium compound.
• In FP2, with a track temperature 10°C cooler than earlier, neither driver felt that they optimised their push lap on the Soft compound. That left them P5 and P7.
• George completed another long run on the Medium tyre to complete the day, with Lewis accumulating useful data by opting for the Soft tyre.
  
  

George Russell

It was a very hot day out there today! It wasn’t quite as bad in the car as I was expecting it to be, but I am sure that will change during the race on Sunday. Everyone in the garage is doing a great job working in such challenging conditions, with temperatures upwards of 35°C in there.

We got a lot of laps in today on the long run. That is really useful data for us to go through tonight. It will help dictate our strategy for the rest of the weekend and inform any improvements we can make to the car ahead of tomorrow. The McLarens and Red Bulls looked very quick today, so we know we’ve got some ground to make up. We don’t seem to be quite as competitive in these very hot conditions so that is something we need to understand. We’re excited to see what we can do tomorrow and hopefully we will be in the mix in the top-five. 

Lewis Hamilton

It is definitely very hot here this weekend. It typically is here in beautiful Budapest at this time of year! Today wasn’t our best day of the season so far. The car set-up didn’t feel great, and we weren’t on our best form. We made a few small tweaks between the sessions but nothing major. We’ve got some ideas as to why the car wasn’t at its best though so we will work hard on it overnight, looking to make improvements ahead of tomorrow.

The competitive order is very close once again out there. Whilst our single lap pace wasn’t the best, our long run was decent. We are still a step behind the ultimate pace at the front but will do what we can to close as much of that gap as possible for Saturday.

Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director

We've had a productive day. We've got some development parts on the car and have been using the sessions to understand the effect they are having on the car balance. The track has been very hot, which is giving the tyres a tough time, but it's a good test of whether we've improved our long run performance.

The single lap balance isn't where we need it yet, but we've got time to work on that overnight and in FP3 tomorrow. There's plenty of areas where we can find a bit more pace on both the single lap and long run, so it's encouraging that if we can make a bit of progress, we should be in a strong position for the rest of the weekend.