Budapest – Australians all let us rejoice, for Ricciardo has won! To say that the 2014 Hungarian Grand Prix was anything less than racing at its finest would be criminal. The 70 lap grand prix began with Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton far from his usual place in the first two rows, as he began the race from the pit lane after a disastrous fire brought his qualifying to a close early on Saturday. With him was the unlucky Dane, Kevin Magnussen, who slid off the rather wet track and into the barriers during Q3.

The grid was set as 1) Rosberg, 2) Vettel, 3) Bottas, 4) Ricciardo, 5) Alonso, 6) Massa, 7) Button, 8) Vergne, 9) Hülkenberg, 10) Kvyat, 11) Sutil, 12) Pérez, 13) Gutierrez, 14) Grosjean, 15) Bianchi, 16) Räikkönen, 17) Kobayashi, 18) Chilton, 19) Ericsson, 20) Maldonado.

All began well, save for Daniil Kvyat whose car shut down as the formation lap was just getting under way. In the first lap of the race, Rosberg was able to break away, holding his lead ahead of Bottas and Alonso, who were able to get around Vettel. Hamilton and Magnussen got their race off to a start from the pit lane, Magnussen quickly making up his unlucky starting place to come into 19th by Lap 4. Hamilton did not have quite as good of a starting lap, spinning off the track at Turn 2, just barely bending part of his front wing out of place.

By Lap 3, Jenson Button had made great pace, rising from 7th to 5th, while his former McLaren teammate at last began to move up the grid, who by Lap 8 had made it up to 13th. At Lap 9, Caterham’s Swedish rookie Marcus Ericsson hit the wall quite hard at Turn 3, leading to the first appearance of the safety car for the day. Thankfully, Ericsson was able to get out of his car and walk away.

The safety car period led to Button, Ricciardo, and Hamilton pitting, putting on dry weather tyres as the rain seemed to be clearing. They were soon followed on Lap 10 by Rosberg, Bottas, Vettel, and Alonso.

The safety car was forced to remain on track for a little while longer than expected, as Lotus’ Romain Grosjean crashed into the barriers at Lap 11 on Turn 3. With the safety car on track, the field was led this time by Ricciardo, Button, Massa, Rosberg, and Magnussen leading. Rosberg had some rear-break issues at this point, and there was some worry that they too might catch fire like his British teammate’s car had done on Saturday.

Thankfully, no such event occurred, and by Lap 14, the safety car was happily returned to the paddock. At that point, the racing recommenced, with Button passing Ricciardo to take the lead. Rosberg’s troubles continued, as he began to lose pace to Toro Rosso’s Jean-Éric Vergne, leaving the German down in 5th. Meanwhile, Hamilton continued to ascend, climbing up to 9th.

At Lap 16, Button pitted, his tyres worn beyond use. Ricciardo retook the lead, followed closely by Felipe Massa in 2nd. At Lap 17, the 10 race scoring streak of Nico Hülkenberg came to a sudden end after, as BBC Sport’s F1 team put it, the German was “punted out of the race by his team-mate Sergio Pérez.”

A collision between Lotus’ Pastor Maldonado and Marussia’s Jules Bianchi on Lap 20 led to both drivers returning to the pits for repairs. Likewise, Sergio Pérez found himself in close proximity with the wall just past the final corner, forcing his retirement from the race, resulting in the return of the safety car to our lives. At the same time, Ricciardo continued to lead the field, followed by Massa, Alonso, and unusually enough, Jean-Éric Vergne of Toro Rosso, who from 4th place continued to hold the Mercedes of drivers championship leader Nico Rosberg at bay in 5th.

The safety car remained on the course until Lap 27, at which point, following pit stops by Ricciardo and Massa, the race leaders were Alonso, Vergne, Rosberg, Vettel, and Hamilton. Rosberg and Hamilton continued to have trouble passing their respective Toro Rosso and Red Bull competitors for the next 6 laps. At Lap 33, Rosberg went into the pits, whilst Vettel caught the kerb on the start-finish straight, sending him hurtling into the wall, which due to amazing skill, and a fair amount of luck, the 4-time world champion missed hitting by a hair.

At Lap 34, Hamilton, finally past Vettel, also made a fantastic pass on Vergne, taking second just 5.4 seconds behind Spanish race leader Alonso. At Lap 38, Rosberg passed Valtteri Bottas for 9th, whilst Lewis Hamilton continued to cut Alonso’s lead down quite dramatically. Hamilton took a brief one lap lead from the pitting Alonso, until the Briton also went into the pits for a tyre change on Lap 40. This left the lead with Ricciardo, Massa, and Räikkönen, who also went in to pit, returning to the track to conduct a beautiful pass on Vettel at Lap 42.

At Lap 51, more fuel was added to the rivalry at Mercedes, when Rosberg began to ask the pit-wall why Hamilton wasn’t letting him through, despite the obvious distance between the two Mercedes cars. Soon there after, Hamilton responded to the pit over the radio, “I’m not slowing down for Nico – if he gets closer he can overtake.” At Lap 54, Ricciardo pitted from the lead, as his rear tyres had begun to give way. He rejoined the field in 4th just behind Rosberg. This left Spainard Fernando Alonso once again in the lead at the Hungaroring, with a 2.1 second gap between him and Hamilton in 2nd place. At Lap 56, Hamilton pitted, rejoining the field in 7th with 3 seconds between him and Räikkönen in 6th place.

Rosberg continued to work on getting onto the podium, climbing to 4th with a pass on Massa at Lap 61. At the same time, his teammate was fast being caught by Ricciardo, as the young driver from Western Australia was running only 0.9 seconds behind the Briton. At Lap 62, with 8 laps remaining, the lead was very much still up in the air, as Alonso was only 0.4 seconds ahead of Hamilton, who in turn was only 0.4 seconds ahead of Ricciardo. At Lap 65, Ricciardo attempted a pass on Hamilton at Turn 2, which did not go the Aussie’s way. At the same time, Rosberg continued to press on the top three, with the pace to catch the leaders by the final lap.

At Lap 67, Ricciardo made the pass, and a brilliant one at that, on Hamilton at Turn 2. One lap later he made a similar move on Alonso at Turn 1, taking the lead of the race. To quote David Coulthard, “There’s just one word for that. Brilliant.” With Ricciardo ahead, Alonso and Hamilton now found themselves with another determined driver on their tails, this time in the form of Hamilton’s German teammate, Nico Rosberg. On Turn 2 of the Lap 70, the final lap, Rosberg attempted a pass on his teammate, but to no avail for the German who had to settle for a 4th place finish.

The results for Hungary stand as follows:

1) Daniel Ricciardo, 2) Fernando Alonso, 3) Lewis Hamilton, 4) Nico Rosberg, 5) Felipe Massa, 6) Kimi Räikkönen, 7) Sebastian Vettel, 8) Valtteri Bottas, 9) Jean-Éric Vergne, 10) Jenson Button

11) Adrian Sutil, 12) Kevin Magnussen, 13) Pastor Maldonado, 14) Daniil Kvyat, 15) Jules Bianchi, 16) Max Chilton.

The following did not finish the race: Esteban Gutierrez, Sergio Pérez, Nico Hülkenberg, Romain Grosjean, and Marcus Ericssson.

Formula 1 is heading into its mid summer break, which will last for 3 weeks. I will be back with more on the world’s greatest motor sport in 3 weeks time with the beautiful Belgian Grand Prix at Spa.

Hockenheim – To say that the 2014 Formula One Santander German Grand Prix was anything less than amazing would be a gross understatement. From the very beginning, the race was bound to be a masterpiece of motor sport.

With four German drivers on the grid: Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg, Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel, Force India’s Nico Hülkenberg, and Sauber’s Adrian Sutil, the home crowd was guaranteed to have quite a few supporters for each of their countrymen, though Vettel and Rosberg did seem to have more supporters than the other two Germans.

The race started with a troublesome situation for Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton, whose crash at the end of Q1 left him initially starting in 16th place. However, due to the need to change his gear box, Hamilton was handed a 5 spot grid penalty, resulting in the Briton starting at the back of the grid from 21st. Hamilton’s teammate, Rosberg, started the race at pole, with Williams’ flying Finn Valtteri Bottas starting at P2.

The second row of the starting grid was the first to garner the attention of the crowd in person, on television, and on radio, as Williams’ Felipe Massa (P3) appeared to run into McLaren’s rookie Kevin Magnussen (P4) at Turn 1, resulting in Massa’s car flipping upside down before rolling back to its proper upright position. Magnussen left the scene mostly unscathed, despite falling back to 21st position. Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo took evasive action, running between the capsized Massa and the wall. The FIA ruled that no further action was “warranted” regarding the incident, as, in their point of view, the offending party had eliminated himself from the race.

At the same time, Lewis Hamilton began his steady ascent up to the front of the pack, by Lap 14 sitting comfortably in 5th place. At this point, Hamilton’s march forward was bogged down, in large part due to the immense skill of the drivers that he was now facing, world champions such as Alonso, Vettel, Button and Räikkönen. 

At Lap 15, the two Ferraris of Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen fought a magnificent battle, which became a bit of a Kimi-sandwich upon Sebastian Vettel’s reentry onto the track from a pit stop as the German and Spaniard caught the Finn in between them at the hairpin turn. Vettel came out winning fourth, whilst Alonso took fifth and Räikkönen took sixth. Upon being sandwiched, Räikkönen also lost more of his front wing, which had already sustained some damage earlier in the race.

By Lap 20, Nico Rosberg’s lead on Valtteri Bottas (2) was up to 9.2 seconds. From this point on, Rosberg had won Hockenheim. The main bit of racing continued behind him for the second through tenth positions. At Lap 28, Romain Grosjean, the unlucky Frenchman at Lotus was forced to retire at the hairpin, reporting to the pit of some issues with the car’s power unit.

Perhaps one of the more strange incidents from Sunday’s race was the brief contact between Hamilton and his former McLaren teammate Jenson Button, when Hamilton’s front wing was slightly broken upon making contact with Button’s MP4-29. The damage would cost Hamilton a second place finish.

At Lap 47, Toro Rosso’s rookie Daniil Kvyat found himself forced to retire after his car went up in flames. The Russian’s frustration with his poor luck was evident. Following the extensive use of the fire extinguishers, Kvyat’s car’s distinctive Red Bull deep blue was well covered by the whitish foam of the extinguishers.

Likewise, at Lap 52, the only of the Germans to retire this weekend, Sauber’s Adrian Sutil did so in the middle of the track after the car spun and stalled at the last corner. Mercedes called Hamilton back into the pits, perhaps in anticipation of a safety car being deployed whilst the marshals removed the Sauber from the track. Unfortunately this plan did not work so well, as no safety car was deployed. Despite this, Hamilton’s fresher tyres were able to take him past Alonso at Lap 56, leaving the Briton in 3rd.

The final six laps of this 67 lap race featured a fantastic fight for fifth between Daniel Ricciardo and Fernando Alonso. Not only did this six lap duel leave the crowd cheering with excitement, it also showcased the excellence in driving that is a hallmark of these two drivers.

By the chequered flag, the order stood as 1) Rosberg, 2) Bottas, 3) Hamilton, 4) Vettel, 5) Alonso, 6) Ricciardo, 7) Hülkenberg, 8) Button, 9) Magnussen, 10) Pérez scoring points. The non-points finishers were 11) Räikkönen, 12) Maldonado, 13) Vergne, 14) Gutierrez, 15) Bianchi, 16) Kobayashi, 17) Chilton, and 18) Ericsson, with Sutil, Kvyat, Grosjean, and Massa in the Did Not Finish category.

This leaves the drivers’ championship with Rosberg with 190 points, leading Hamilton’s 176 points by a margin of 14 points. Behind the two Mercedes past the century mark is Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo with 106 points.

In constructors, with Valtteri Bottas’ fantastic third straight podium finish, Williams currently stands in 3rd with 121 points, behind Red Bull’s 2nd place at 188 points and Mercedes’ dominant 1st place at 366 points. Williams is followed by Ferrari’s 116 points (4th place,) Force India’s 98 points, McLaren’s 96 points, Toro Rosso’s 15 points, Lotus’ 8 points, and Marussia’s 2 points. At the bottom Sauber and Caterham’s general lack of points scored has left both teams concerned for their futures, as they both should be.

Next weekend, the Formula One Circus returns to Budapest, where they will compete in this year’s instalment of the always fascinating, and often scorching hot, Hungarian Grand Prix.