Hamilton opens up on big setup tweaks between FP1 and FP2

Lewis Hamilton ended Friday as the fastest driver at the Hungarian Grand Prix after Ferrari completed a dominant day at the Hungaroring, with the seven-time world champion leading team-mate Charles Leclerc in the second free practice session.

Ferrari looked competitive from the outset of the weekend. Leclerc set the pace in FP1 with a lap almost half a second quicker than Red Bull's Max Verstappen, although the session was not entirely straightforward for the Monegasque, who returned to the pit lane late in the session with a technical issue.

Hamilton's opening practice was also far from perfect. The Briton narrowly avoided spinning at the final corner during the early stages and later reported problems with his gear shifts over the team radio. Despite those setbacks, he still finished third in FP1 before Ferrari made significant progress ahead of the afternoon session.

The improvements paid off in FP2, where Hamilton clocked a 1:18.729 to finish 0.148 seconds ahead of Leclerc. The Ferrari pair appeared comfortably clear of the rest of the field, underlining the Scuderia's impressive pace around the Hungaroring.

Reflecting on the day, Hamilton said Ferrari had moved the car in the right direction between the two practice sessions.

"It was a solid day overall. The conditions were quite challenging, with the wind making things a bit tricky and the track feeling quite bumpy in some places."

The Briton was encouraged by the progress made during the afternoon: "The car felt better in FP2 and we made some good progress between the sessions, although there are still a few areas we need to improve."

Despite ending the day on top of the timesheets, Hamilton believes there is still more performance to unlock before qualifying.

"We'll go through all the data overnight, keep working on the balance and hopefully find a bit more performance for tomorrow," concluded the seven-time world champion.

Leclerc, meanwhile, was equally positive about Ferrari's performance after topping FP1 and finishing second in FP2.

"Our overall performance seems to be quite good, which is a positive. There is still a long way to go this weekend, so we have to be on it and work hard to make sure we stay on top tomorrow."

However, the Monegasque expects Ferrari's advantage to shrink as its rivals extract more performance overnight.

"It's going to be tight in qualifying. I don't expect us to see the same gap that we saw to our competitors today, so we will have to do a perfect job. If the feeling in the car is there, I'm sure we will have a good one."