Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur admitted his squad was caught out by Verstappen’s 29-lap stint on soft tyres that yielded Red Bull second in Formula 1’s Hungarian Grand Prix, with team principal Laurent Mekies praising his team for a “spicy” strategy call.
Verstappen clinched second in Budapest despite suffering another difficult weekend in the Red Bull, while both Ferrari drivers Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton dropped off the podium behind Kimi Antonelli, unable to capitalise on the SF-26’s inherent pace.
When Ferrari’s decision to start both Leclerc and Hamilton on softs didn’t yield them any track position gains at the start, it felt like the team had boxed itself in. Hamilton bailed after only 13 laps to move onto the hard tyres, which Ferrari didn’t turn out to be particularly quick on, with Leclerc following three laps later.
Hamilton’s stop prompted a response from Verstappen, who couldn’t avoid being undercut, but an exquisite overtake into Turn 1 restored the order for the Red Bull man. But the poor pace on hards prompted the seven-time world champion to box again after only 17 laps, setting up a three-stopper – with Leclerc following suit on lap 36. Crucially, both Ferraris were put on another set of hard tyres, though, so there was some surprise when Verstappen’s second pitstop on lap 41 of 70 was a move to scrubbed softs.
Ferrari’s surprise was shared by the Dutchman himself, too. “Is there any proof around me that this soft will last?,” he asked his race engineer.
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When Oscar Piastri‘s stricken McLaren therefore caused a virtual safety car on lap 56, Ferrari made a relatively straightforward decision to pit him for another set of softs, ceding track position to Verstappen who was surely going to come in as well.
But Red Bull kept him out, setting up a mammoth 29-lap stint on softs, which Verstappen executed to perfection to snatch second – a result beyond Red Bull’s wildest expectations after a troubled weekend with the RB22.
“The team put me on the softs, which initially I was like, ‘That’s going to be a long one to the end,’ but we made it work,” a bemused Verstappen said. “I was just like, ‘How the hell did I end up here?’ I was shocked, I’m actually still shocked.”
As it happened, Hamilton also fell behind Antonelli to drop off the podium, with a five-second pitlane speeding penalty punting him to fifth behind Leclerc.
Mekies: “There have been a number of quite spicy strategy calls”
Red Bull team principal Mekies praised his strategy team for its bold call to keep Verstappen out. “There have been a number of quite spicy strategy calls made by the guys today, including the one of the VSC,” Mekies said. “But not only [that one], if you look at the earlier move not to cover Lewis when he pitted early on. And as always, they always get it right. So very well done to the pit wall and to the whole team back home.
“As a whole, race execution has been very, very strong here. We have suffered at the beginning of the year with our starts. We are now managing to produce decent starts, strong pit stops, very strong strategy as always. So certainly, very happy with the way the team has been operating in these last few races as it’s going to be back to the standard it’s known for.”
On the other side, Ferrari boss Vasseur admitted the team did not see Verstappen’s nearly half-race stint on soft tyres coming.
“It’s true that at the end of the race I think everybody was surprised because Max did something like 37 laps with softs,” he said. “We were expecting a life half of this, perhaps.
“The hard [tyre] was much more difficult, but you discover this a bit too late. We were trying to do the undercut, and it was working at one stage, you anticipate the pit stop and you can’t react. It was surprising, but I think it’s surprising for everybody.”
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Vasseur said the call to bring both of his drivers in under Piastri’s VSC was informed by how well Verstappen’s softs were holding up, but that realisation came too late to defeat the Dutchman.
“We realised 20 laps before the end that the soft was not that bad with the stint of Max,” the Frenchman explained. “We decided to go for softs because we had the oldest hards of the field.
“As we had a poor start, then you try to do the undercut, you [change] the tyres very early, and you have to take decisions before the others. I think if I had to do the same, I would do the same today, to try to push with the soft.”
At the end of the day, Ferrari’s weekend could have looked very different with a cleaner performance in qualifying and a better race day execution, having not been able to capitalise on a quick car to at least crown the podium. But Vasseur also acknowledged Norris was in a league of his own aboard the McLaren.
“What is clear is that Lando was very, very quick, much more than Oscar. When he was on his own, he was flying” he said. “We were probably faster than Oscar. But it’s difficult to know what your pace is when you don’t have clean air.
“I don’t know if we were able to win or not, but I think if you put Charles second in Turn 2, that would have been a different race for us.”
Additional reporting by Roberto Chinchero and Ronald Vording
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