Formula 1 ended the first half of the season with McLaren back on top. Lando Norris won the Hungarian GP with authority, while Oscar Piastri retired after gearbox problems when he was still dreaming of victory.
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The result reinforces the team’s recent evolution, which attributed the performance leap to the updates introduced to the car. In addition to Norris’s triumph, McLaren highlighted that the MCL40 is once again competitive enough to regularly fight for victories, although there are still concerns about reliability.
Norris stated that he had one of his best performances in the category: “I am very happy to park the car in front of the number 1 board again. The car was fantastic to drive and my pace today was probably one of the best I’ve ever had,” he stated. The Briton also highlighted the work done by the team: “I am very proud of everyone and it’s good to be able to reward that effort with a victory.”
The British driver believes that the track favored both his driving style and the MCL40, but showed confidence for the rest of the championship: “There will be tracks where we will have more difficulties, but I certainly believe we can win other races,” he added, emphasizing that McLaren will continue to bring new developments to the car after the category’s break.
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Piastri, in turn, lamented a complicated weekend. After taking the lead on the first lap, the Australian lost performance on hard tires, was hit by a backmarker, and subsequently retired due to a gearbox failure: “Oscar deserved the opportunity to fight for victory after taking the lead, but his race was compromised by the incident with a backmarker and then by the gearbox failure,” said team principal Andrea Stella.
Stella also directly attributed the performance presented to the updates introduced to the car. According to him, the performance gain validates the technical direction chosen by McLaren and demonstrates the joint effort of the aerodynamics, design, manufacturing, and logistics departments. Despite celebrating the victory, he acknowledged that the team will continue to work on reliability and new developments before the return of activities in Zandvoort.
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