Hungarian Grand Prix 2011 marked Jenson Button's 200th Formula 1 race. He had a small party with several drivers and former team bosses to mark the occasion but quickly had to pack the cake away for the real work on Sunday.
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| Button's 200th Grand Prix (Photo by @theFifthDriver) |
A wet track meant all drivers started on Intermediate tyres. Vettel had a decent start but both McLaren drivers (who started in 2nd and 3rd) were not far behind him. The tricky conditions meant a lot of sliding, fair battles between both McLaren drivers and an error from Vettel saw Hamilton take the lead in the 5th lap of the 70-lap race.
A dry line soon appeared on the track and most drivers switched to Super-Soft tyres (option tyres). Hamilton pulled out a lead, but it soon started raining again and some drivers made the controversial move onto Intermediates while others swapped to Soft (Prime) tyres. It turned out to be the wrong strategy as drivers like Hamilton and Webber couldn't make the tyres 'work for them'.
Hamilton's race went from bad to worse when he spun on the 'wrong tyres' and corrected his car, causing Paul di Resta to move off the racing line to avoid him. The stewards decided this warranted a penalty. He changed to prime tyres and later served a drive-through penalty for this non-incident to rejoin the race in 6th position.
Ever the persistent driver, Hamilton managed to catch and overtake Webber and Massa to finish 4th while his team-mate took the win on his 200th Grand Prix. Other notable drives at Hungary were from Paul di Resta , the only rookie to score points on Sunday (7th) and Sebastian Buemi who started in 23rd position due to his penalty from the German Grand Prix and finished 8th.
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| Buemi at Monaco GP (Photo by @duskyBlogF1) |
McLaren scored 37 valuable points and it was a great way to head into the compulsory break for Formula 1 teams.
