This weekends Hungarian Grand Prix is the final round before the much needed summer break for all the teams, Williams Racing will be hoping to go into the break on a high, perhaps even on a points finish!
Williams won the first-ever Formula 1 race at the Hungaroring back in 1986, Nelson Piquet took victory on that day but a points finish this weekend may taste just as sweet for the team. Overtaking is notoriously difficult at the circuit which makes qualifying very important.
This should suit George Russell who will almost certainly be doing everything he can to go into the summer break on the back of a points finish this weekend. Nicholas Latifi will also be hoping for a strong weekend based on the team’s performance at the venue over recent years.
Head of Vehicle Performance Dave Robson is looking forward to the challenge the twisty circuit brings, almost the opposite of the recent British Grand Prix.
“The short twisty Hungaroring is a stark contrast to the fast-flowing Silverstone track, but it nonetheless offers an exciting challenge. Overtaking is very difficult, which places a premium on qualifying position. The weather in Budapest in late July is typically very hot and this makes tyre management difficult and therefore heavily dictates the set-up direction.
“Following the Sprint Qualifying format two weeks ago in Great Britain, we return to a standard event format this weekend, which gives us more opportunity to tune the car set-up to the tyre behaviour.
“In recent years we have been reasonably strong in Budapest and we hope to continue the trend this year. The FW43B has been performing well recently and if we can adapt it to the longer, slower corners of the Hungaroring then we will be in a good position to get the most from the tyres, which this week are the middle-of-the-range: C2, C3 and C4 compounds. The new rear tyre construction, which Pirelli introduced at the British Grand Prix behaved as expected and should be well suited to the Budapest track.”
