The Formula 1 circus is heading into a well-deserved summer break after a gruelling 14-race stretch. And if the puzzling Budapest weekend is anything to go by, some drivers and teams will need more time than others to decompress.
Winner: Lando Norris
Starting from the better side of the grid nearly netted Lando Norris second over Piastri at the start, but instead the Briton got boxed in and passed by George Russell and Fernando Alonso. Funnily enough, that poor start seemed to trigger a series of events that landed Norris a ninth grand prix win, as the ground he lost to Piastri led to him extending his first stint and resort to an – at the time – ambitious one-stopper.
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McLaren insists that even at that stage it wasn’t sure Norris could actually pull that off. But after Piastri unsuccessfully tried to undercut polesitter Charles Leclerc, the Australian immediately started worrying about Norris’ strategy on the radio rather than about the Ferrari man, and with good reason.
The end result was a short but intense battle between the two, with Piastri catching Norris hand over fist on fresher tyres but then unable to find a way past. It’s one of those races where Piastri didn’t do anything wrong but still found himself on the losing end. Norris emerged as the winner on the day as he goes into the summer break just nine points behind, while Piastri will still fancy his chances to stay on top.
Meanwhile, we got to see the two dominant cars race on the front foot to find a way to win, rather than ensuring they finished ahead of the other. McLaren didn’t take its 200th grand prix victory by being conservative. It did so by going motor racing.
Photo by: Beata Zawrzel / NurPhoto via Getty Images
Loser: Charles Leclerc
While McLaren lost performance in a windy Q3 session, Leclerc delivered a brilliant qualifying lap to take an unexpected pole. And the Monegasque looked quick in the race too, until his pace suddenly collapsed after a second stop for hards.
Leclerc had already been frustrated earlier in the race with some of the choices his engineers had made, which team boss Vasseur explained was related to energy deployment. But with a much slower Ferrari his race unravelled from there, and Leclerc was powerless to stay out of the clutches of George Russell.
His frustration appeared to turn into a bout of road rage as he twice moved under braking to fend off Russell, with the Briton having to react swiftly to avoid an accident. Given the chasm behind the pair, Leclerc’s five-second penalty for erratic driving was lenient. Very lenient.
George Russell, Mercedes
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Winner: George Russell
Coming out of a tough spell, Mercedes is back on the podium after rolling back its car to its pre-Imola spec and reverting to the old rear suspension. With that upgrade (read: downgrade) off the car, Mercedes’ pace and stability returned, and Russell too could have snatched pole on Saturday if it hadn’t been for a tricky final corner in gusty conditions.
The cooler conditions clearly helped the W15, as it negated Mercedes’ well documented vulnerability in the heat on what could have been a tricky circuit. And it allowed Russell to pick up where he left off as one of F1 2025’s standout performers, jumping Norris at the start before finishing as the highest non-McLaren driver, which is something of a victory in itself.
Russell, who said he would disappear straight away for holiday on Sunday night, will be able to enjoy his time off in peace. That new Mercedes contract will be in the mail soon, and it will be well earned.
Photo by: Zak Mauger / LAT Images via Getty Images
Loser: Lewis Hamilton
Russell’s former team-mate Lewis Hamilton also looks ready for a vacation after a brutal first chapter of his highly anticipated Ferrari stint. Just as he started getting closer to Leclerc and looked to have overcome his adaption period, Hamilton suffered two disappointing qualifying sessions in quick succession to knock the wind out of his sails.
A valiant comeback race in Spa was never going to be repeated on the narrow confines of the Hungaroring, and while Hamilton has had his ups and down before it was quite telling for him to suggest Ferrari should just get a different driver – one of the few quiet phrases he let slip to the media across two gloomy days.
The break comes at a good time for Hamilton as he resets for the second half of the year. And to end on a positive note, the reality is that his last two weekends haven’t actually been as bad as Hamilton’s mood and results would suggest, having been pegged back by a tight track limits call in Spa qualifying and an even narrower Q2 exit in Budapest. But it hasn’t been the grand Ferrari entrance he and the tifosi dreamed off, far from it.
Gabriel Bortoleto, Sauber
Photo by: Jayce Illman / Getty Images
Winners: Gabriel Bortoleto, Sauber
Bubbly Bortoleto was the antidote to Hamilton’s misery after the Brazilian capped off another outstanding weekend with his best F1 result, qualifying seventh and finishing sixth.
Gabriel Bortoleto admitted it was quite surreal to be sandwiched in between his world championship winning friends Fernando Alonso and Max Verstappen in the opening stint, but he did not look out of place there as he made the most of Sauber‘s recent upgrades, rewarding him for his patience during a tough season start for the team.
With team-mate Nico Hulkenberg on the back foot after qualifying, Sauber could count on its other driver to sustain its constructors’ championship aspirations. The only downside is that its rival Aston Martin got both cars in the points.
Photo by: Clive Rose / Formula 1 via Getty Images
Losers: Red Bull
Red Bull outdid Monza 2024 with what was arguably its worst race weekend performance in recent years, and it was a rare sight to even see Max Verstappen having to fight to make it to Q3.
Much has been made of the RB21’s tricky balance, which has actually improved in recent months, but on the Hungaroring the car just seemed to lack overall grip and thus laptime. Both Verstappen and Yuki Tsunoda, who quietly did a relatively good job this weekend despite his Q2 exit, were then sliding so much in the race that a one-stop strategy was out of the question.
Red Bull was so poor this weekend on a low to medium speed circuit that most clues point towards an inability to switch on the tyres and get into the car’s narrow operation window. This is why both team boss Laurent Mekies and advisor Helmut Marko were confident Budapest was a one-off. If you’re a Dutch fan with hard earned Zandvoort tickets in the pocket, you’ll have to hope they are right.
Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin Racing
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Winners: Aston Martin
If anyone knows what is going on with Aston Martin’s recent performances, then a certain Lawrence S. has a job offer on his Silverstone desk with your name on it. From being absolutely nowhere in Spa, Aston suddenly leapt to the front of the midfield in Hungary and collected 16 points to move up to sixth in the standings.
That suggests a track specific issue on high-speed circuits where aerodynamic efficiency is a key requirement, while the Hungaroring is more about piling load onto the cars with fewer straights to worry about. But the truth seems more complicated than that, as both fifth-placed Fernando Alonso and seventh-placed Lance Stroll seemed in the dark about what has really happened.
Alonso, who opportunistically moved up to fourth at the start before inevitably losing the spot again to Norris, summed it up best: “The good thing is that we were fast. The concerning thing is that we don’t know why.”
Alexander Albon, Williams
Photo by: Alastair Staley / LAT Images via Getty Images
Losers: Williams, Alpine
Williams, Alpine and Haas all left Budapest without points in their bags, so take your pick. Perhaps Williams will be the most disappointed given the recent upgrade package that looked to give it a fighting chance to regain control of the battle for fifth.
The fact that it got those upgrades on the car in Spa, when they were originally planned for Zandvoort, speaks to Williams’ more efficient development process behind the scenes at Grove. But while it has made its car much more of an all-rounder compared to the infamous straight-line rockets of old, circuits with long, medium to high-speed corners like Hungaroring still seem to be its kryptonite.
Aston’s big points haul has now negated Albon’s excellent Belgium result, setting up an intriguing midfield battle for the remainder of 2025 that also involves Sauber, Racing Bulls and Haas.
Alpine just doesn’t seem to be in the conversation right now, and looks like it will need more opportunistic Pierre Gasly heroics in changing conditions.
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