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WHAT’S THE STORY?
After the fast corners and cool temperatures of Silverstone and the
Nurburgring, the tight and twisty Hungaroring on the outskirts of Budapest
in Hungary – which is normally characterised by hot weather at this time of
year – presents a stark contrast for the Pirelli P Zero tyres. The
Hungaroring was inaugurated in 1986, after just eight months of construction
work, as the first grand prix in Eastern Europe.
Since then it has proved to be extraordinarily popular, even though it is
used very infrequently outside of the grand prix. This is key to one of the
circuit’s main features: a dusty, slippery surface that progressively
rubbers in over the course of the weekend.
This puts grip at a premium, which is one of the reasons why Pirelli has
brought the P Zero Yellow soft and P Zero Red supersoft tyres to the
Hungaroring. The 16 corners are tight and narrow, similar to Monte Carlo,
with a low average speed. This makes the circuit ideally suited to the
softer tyres in Pirelli’s P Zero range, although this is the first time all
season that the supersoft will face competition in very warm weather.
While it rained in Budapest over the weekend, temperatures for the race are
expected to be in the region of 26 or 27 degrees centigrade, meaning that
the drivers will have to think about conserving their tyres. With the
Hungaroring renowned as a track where overtaking is difficult, like Monaco,
the teams are presented with a chance to make up places through clever use
of tyre strategy – and this is sure to be one of the focal points of the
weekend.
Spectators are able to see a lot of the action at first hand as from most
vantage points 80% of the circuit is visible, due to its location in a
natural bowl. The track surface itself tends to be bumpy, testing traction
to the limit as well. For this race, there will be no allocation of extra
tyres for free practice, leaving teams with their normal 11 sets of tyres
for the weekend.
PIRELLI’S MOTORSPORT DIRECTOR SAYS:
Paul Hembery: “Hungary certainly couldn’t be more different to the races we
have seen recently, as we found out when we went to the Hungaroring for our
first season of the GP3 series last year. However, as the GP3 tyres are
completely different to those we race in Formula One, there’s not much that
we learned apart from an initial idea of what to expect: high temperatures
and a slippery track surface. The big challenge for the
teams and drivers is going to be keeping tyre wear under control in the warm
conditions, but we have used the P Zero Yellow soft tyre in warm weather
before and it has shown good performance. The supersoft tyre is almost
certain to result in some quick qualifying laps but obviously it doesn’t
have the same resistance to wear. How the teams juggle the parameters of
speed and durability will once again form the key to their different
strategies. There has been plenty of drama at the Hungaroring in the past
and with so many new elements to the racing this year, I hope we’re in for
another exciting grand prix. ”
THE MEN BEHIND THE STEERING WHEEL SAY:
Vitaly Petrov (Lotus Renault GP): “We had plenty of good potential in Monaco
and Canada, both of which have similar characteristics to the Hungaroring,
so I’m hopeful of another good race in Hungary. Canada was slightly
different, because we used the wet and intermediate tyres, which should not
be the case in Hungary, but our performance on this type of circuit is good.
One of our biggest challenges so far this season has been to get up to speed
with the tyres straight away in free practice, so that we are well prepared
for qualifying. This will be even more important than usual in Hungary,
where it is easy to have understeer but quite difficult to overtake. We will
also need to understand how long we are able to run on the supersoft, which
is going to be a crucial part of the strategy for everyone. So far the
Pirelli tyres have been fun to drive and the performance has been good when
we get the best out of them – like when I was on the podium in Australia at
the start of the year – but in general I think we need to find a bit more
consistency.”
TECHNICAL NOTES:
* The Hungaroring is one of the
lowest grip circuits of the year, which means that tyre wear is not
particularly extreme. However, the high temperatures, non-stop succession of
corners and low average speeds with little airflow make it one of the most
physically demanding races of the year for the drivers. It has only rained
once there, in 2006.
* The unusual layout of the Hungarian circuit is well-known for producing
several new winners. Damon Hill (1993), Fernando Alonso (2003), Jenson
Button (2006) and Heikki Kovalainen (2008) all took their debut wins at the
Hungaroring.
* The Hungaroring requires a high-downforce set-up, as the cars are on full
throttle for only around 10 seconds over the course of the 4.381-kilometre
lap. Soft suspension settings at the rear help to optimise the mechanical
grip and traction out of all the corners, but this can cause excessive
loading on the rear tyres.
PIRELLI IN HUNGARY:
* Pirelli’s first activity in
Hungary was via the cables business, which was subsequently sold, but the
company has since grown to be one of the leading players in the Eastern
European tyre market, with the emphasis on winter tyre sales.
* Pirelli had never raced on a circuit in Hungary prior to the 2010 GP3
Series. However, the Italian company has enjoyed numerous successes on the
Hungarian Rally Championship.
* Pirelli supplies Suzuki with original equipment in Hungary, which has been
the biggest manufacturer importer into Hungary for more than 10 years. |
