The Hungarian Grand Prix 2016 was the 11th round of the 2016 F1 season, and took place at the Hungaroring in Budapest, Hungary, on July 24th.
Lewis Hamilton won the race after starting in the 2nd position, followed by Nico Rosberg, who originally had the pole position, and Daniel Ricciardo completing the podium.
Final results
Race evolution
Pit Stops
There were a total of 45 pit stops during the race.
The most popular pit stop windows were:
- Laps 14-17: 12 stops
- Laps 24-29: 8 stops
- Laps 35-46: 17 stops
The fastest pit stop was Jenson Button's, stopping the clock at 16.486 seconds during his pit stop on lap 10, while the slowest one was was Sergio Pérez's, who stopped the clock at 29.941 seconds, 13.455 seconds slower than Button, during his pit stop on lap 40.
These times include the time the driver spent going through the pit lane, as well as the actual time he stopped for the mechanics to work on his car.
Strategy
We saw a variety of options in terms of pit stop strategies during this race, however most drivers chose a 2 stops. Only 1 driver tried a 1 stop, and 2 drivers tried a 3 stops.
The race winner, Lewis Hamilton, was on a 2 stops strategy.
1 stop
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-Rio Haryanto
2 stops
-
1Pascal Wehrlein
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1Felipe Nasr
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1Sebastian Vettel
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1Nico Hülkenberg
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3Romain Grosjean
-
-Daniel Ricciardo
-
-Fernando Alonso
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2Esteban Gutiérrez
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1Lewis Hamilton
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1Max Verstappen
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2Carlos Sainz
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1Valtteri Bottas
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1Nico Rosberg
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4Kevin Magnussen
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4Daniil Kvyat
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-Felipe Massa
-
5Jolyon Palmer
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2Sergio Pérez
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8Kimi Räikkönen
3 stops
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14Jenson Button
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2Marcus Ericsson
Excluding those drivers who could not finish the race, those on a 1 stop strategy didn't gain or lose any positions on average, the ones on a 2 stops strategy lost an average of 0.63 positions, while those on a 3 stops strategy gained 2 positions on average.
Despite of the average possitons gained or lost, and considering a deeper analysis of the performance of each strategy, we consider the 2 stops strategy as the optimal for this race.
It is important to note that this might not always be the case for other races held at the Hungaroring, as the conditions might change from year to year, in terms of wheel degradation, accidents, safety cars, etc.
Incidents
There race went on mostly with no incidents. Only 1 divers were involved in circumstances that were severe enough to prevented them from finishing the race.
These included, .
Oil leak
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Jenson ButtonLap 60
Qualifying
Nico Rosberg managed to get the pole position by 0.143 seconds and a final lipe time of 1:19.965. Lewis Hamilton was right behind him, helping Mercedes score a one-two and monopolize the first line of the grid.
The second line fo the grid was dominated by Red Bull, with Daniel Ricciardo in third position, and Max Verstappen in fourth.
Track evolution
As the qualifying session went on, with the track rubbering in, and the drivers testing the limits of the grip of their cars, the times per lap dropped, and 15 out of the 16 drivers that took place in Q2 were able to improve their times.
The Q3 is the time were all the remaining drivers put all their cards on the table, even those with a superior car who might have been managing their times in Q1 and Q2 push their cars to the limit in Q3. It therefore comes as no surprise that all of the drivers that took place in Q3 managed to improve their times in this last session.