Before the action continues at this weekend's Dutch Grand Prix, F1Technical's senior writer Balazs Szabo reveals some of his observations from trackside at the Hungaroring.

The Hungarian Grand Prix saw McLaren further strengthen their lead in the Constructors’ Championship. The papaya team has won eleven of the first fourteen races, and secured seven double victories so far in 2025.

This hugely impressive result has enabled McLaren to build up an insurmountable lead in the teams’ standings, with Ferrari sitting second, but the Scuderia has a 299-point deficit to the Woking-based squad’s tally of 559 points.

However, besides the results, there were plenty to watch out for at the Hungaroring. Attending race weekends and following the on-track actions from different spots of race tracks can lift lid on many things that cannot be observed from the TV coverage.

At the Hungaroring, the best spot to observe the different characteristics of the cars and different driving techniques of drivers is the combination of Turns 6 and 7 which is usually simply referred to as the 'chicane.'

Hamilton struggled for consistens balance

Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton's struggles at the Hungaroring are well-documented. The British driver looked to struggle on the opening day of the Budapest round before he came alive in the third and final practice.

However, with the conditions having taken a massive turn - some drizzle in Q2, strong wind gusts, clouds - for qualifying, even his team-mate Charles Leclerc looked to have lost his impressive form from earlier in the weekend.

The British driver qualified down in P12, and having spent the majority of the race stuck in traffic, he ended up where he started.

Observing Hamilton's car control across the practice sessions and qualifying, it is obvious that the driver, who still holds the record for most victories at the Hungaroring, suffers from inconsistent balance.

Hamilton prefers a strong front-end on which he can rely in order to brake late and throw the car into the corner. This generation of ground-effect cars will always handicap Hamilton as they tend to an understeery nature, but the SF-25 seems to make things even more complicated for the Briton.

In simple terms, there were no two consecutive laps across the Friday practice sessions when Hamilton could maintain the same line through the combination of Turn 6 and 7.

On some laps, Hamilton looked to miss the braking point which saw him lose time in mid-corner, while on other occasions, the seven-time F1 champion entered the chicane as he wanted to, but had to calm down the rear end of his Ferrari at the exit of the chicane to a lack of rear stability.

"Big, big struggle with the balance of the car,” the Briton said. “A lot different to the previous years I've been here. It's just very, very inconsistent balance from corner to corner.

“So you can't say it's just understeer, you can't just say it's oversteer. It's just far from being on rails, and very, very out of balance.

"But I think it's probably something to do with maybe high temperatures or something, so we're going to try and figure that out for tomorrow," Hamilton's words confirmed our observations.

King of change of direction

The fact that McLaren won 11 of the first 13 races in 2025 is a real testament for their technical domination in the final year under the current set of technical regulation.

Interestingly, their MCL39 does not excel in a particular area as their 2023 F1 car which was truly impressive through the high-speed corners, but lack speed in slow-speed turns.

McLaren's current car is a 'mature' car that can display great performance in slow-, medium- and high-speed corners, but is not shy of recording impressive straight-line speed either.

Exactly this lack of weaknesses makes the MCL39 particularly strong on tracks that reward aerodynamic efficiency such as Spa-Francorchamps or circuit that features a mixtures of different types of corners.

While rival teams can find the setup for certain corners with mechanical and aerodynamical tools, tracks like the aforementioned Spa-Francorchamps require cars to excel in all types of corners.

The Belgian round highlighted McLaren's advantage in this regard. Red Bull's Max Verstappen initially looked Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris' biggest rival, but his RB21 was either superior down the straights or competitive in the aerodynamic downforce-dictated middle sector.

Red Bull elected to run low-load rear wing on Friday, which saw Verstappen excel in Sector 1 and 3, but lost almost a second to the McLarens in the middle part of the 7.004km track.

In contrast, the rain threat forced Red Bull to mount a higher-load rear wing on Verstappen's car on Saturday which saw the reigning champion emerge as the quickest driver behind the McLaren in Sector 2, but he lost his competitiveness in the opening and closing section of the track.

But where did McLaren stand out in Hungary? To give a simple answer: in the short section between Turn 6 and 7. The two McLaren drivers, particularly Norris excelled through the chicane, particularly when

Antonelli's aggressive driving style

Andrea Kimi Antonelli's struggles in recent weeks are well-documented. After a hugely impressive start to his rookie F1 season, the Italian was embroiled in a negatve spiral from his home race at Imola onwards where he retired with reliability issues. After that, he sturggled to score points in the following races.

Althogh he secured his first F1 podium finish at Montreal, he only finished twice over the stretch of eight races, with the Hungarian Grand Prix having been his only race where he ended up in the points-paying positions.

Mercedes quite openly revealed their issues with their suspension upgrade which made the W16 unstable and inconsistent. The Brackley-based outfit was forced to switch back to the pre-Imola configuration at the Hungarian Grand Prix which seemingly brought the car back into a more pleasing working window.

Reflecting on his issues, Antonelli conceded that his own driving style might have also contributed to the issues or at least it made things even worse for him.

"When turning in fast corners on the brakes, the rear end became unstable, and it was difficult to feel whether the grip was losing or not.

"My aggressive driving style had exacerbated this problem. The car became even more unpredictable. But I also have to take responsibility for myself and should have adjusted my driving style better," concluded the Italian.

Observing the Bologna-born driver, it was obvious what he had talked about when he referred to his aggressive driving style.

The Italian was extremely aggressive at the exit of the chicane. Although he was relatively cautious into the entry of the chicane, keeping his W16 under control, he was very early on the throttle which resulted in his car exiting the chicane quite nervously.

While the majority of the field only struggled for rear stability when tyre degradation or overheating kicked in, Antonelli looked to deliberately exit the chicane very aggressively.

In contrast, his team-mate George Russell was smooth through the entirety of the chicane regardless the tyre compound.