Hungary: A look at the Hungaoring

By Karl King
July 28 2005

In a dismal year of racing in 2004, Ferrari wrapped up the construcors' here at the Hungaroring, said to be the most boring race of the year. Let's have a look at some facts from 2004 and look at the history.

Circuit/Date Hungaroring/31st July 2005
Start time (local/GMT) 14:00 hrs/12:00 hrs
Lap/Race distance 4.381 km/306.663 km (70 laps)
Winner 2004 Michael Schumacher (Scuderia Ferrari)
Pole 2004 Michael Schumacher (Scuderia Ferrari), 1:19.146 min
Lap record Michael Schumacher (Scuderia Ferrari), 1:19.071 min (2004)

Christiano da Matta set the top race speed in 2003 for Toyota, clocking 298.9km/h blasted the next year by M. Schumacher who hit 313.8km/h demonstrating the whopping pace of development in F1 at that time. Don't expect too much of the same this year though, after Mosely stuck his oar in to slow down the cars.

2002 was won on a two stop srategy as was 2003, the following 2 years were won by 3 stoppers.

At a circuit where you usually finish where you start unless there are DNF's ahead, tyre wear is medium and grip level is reasonably low. However, brake wear is particularly high, let's hope we don't see what happened to Jarno in Canada.

In 2003 the main straight was extended adding about 7 seconds to the lap times from the previous year.

Take a read of the history below of the track taken from www.hungaroring.hu.

The Hungaroring circuit is 19 km from the centre of Budapest, alongside the M3 motorway at the border of the village, Mogyoród. The track is in a natural valley, surrounded by 50 hectares of rolling hillside. With this exceptional natural advantage, almost 80 percent of the racetrack is visible from any point. This is the reason why it is called "The Shallow Plate", it is because the spectators are watching races sitting by the side of an imaginary plate.

At the Grand Opening, the total length of the Hungaroring was 4013,786 metres. A minor correction was made during 1989, as a result of cutting an S-curve combination, the circuit became faster, giving an extra overtaking opportunity to the drivers; hence, the full track length was reduced to 3968 metres.

The smallest radius of a curve is 20 metres, while the largest is 400 metres. The full length of the start-finish line is 700 metres; the top speed here is approximately 320 km/h. The track is at its widest here: 15 metres, elsewhere the width varies between 10 and 11 metres, relative to the possible highest speed.
The surface structure is a triple layer of asphalt, 5 cm thick each on 20-cm thick rubble and 20-cm thick concrete. The relative level difference between the highest and lowest point of the Ring is 36 metres. The greatest slope is 6,4%, while the largest descent is as much as 6,7%.

The Hungaroring circuit meets the highest technical requirements and has become one of safest racetracks in the world. Due to the reconstruction works being carried out at Hungaroring Circuit - being negotiated and agreed with the FIA (Federation Internationale de l'Automobile), FOM (Formula One Management Ltd.) and the local ASN, the National Automobile Sport Federation of Hungary - in the year 2003 the start-straight has become 202 metres longer while the circuit length changed to 4384,08 metres.