Lewis Hamilton issues apology to Mercedes after disastrous Hungarian GP start

23 July 2023 , 13:15

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Lewis Hamilton suffered an awful start to the Hungarian GP (Image: HOCH ZWEI/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images)

Lewis Hamilton threw away his fairytale pole position for the Hungarian Grand Prix with a horrible start off the line.

The Brit upstaged Max Verstappen to take pole from his Formula 1 rival on Sunday. But the Red Bull had the lead of the race by the first corner as Hamilton suffered a horrible start.

And it got worse from there. Not only did Verstappen overtake, but he also fell behind the two McLaren cars in the opening few corners and was in fourth place in the blink of an eye.

The seven-time world champion was clearly frustrated but also took full responsibility as he took to the radio. "Sorry about that guys," he said, the disappointment evident in his voice.

He wasn't the only one who suffered a wretched start. Zhou Guanyu was on cloud nine after qualifying fifth for this race, but also got a terrible launch and tumbled down the order.

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Zhou was so flustered that he made contact with the back of Daniel Ricciardo at the first corner. That sent the AlphaTauri into one of the Alpines, which then made contact with his own team-mate.

That meant, for the second race in a row, Alpine suffered a double DNF. And Zhou was slapped with a time penalty for causing that collision – but he was already down to last place out of the 18 cars still running and out of points contention anyway.

Verstappen was already ahead of Hamilton heading into the first corner (Getty Images)

Hamilton's loss was McLaren's gain. Both had got past the Mercedes in those opening corners, but it was not Lando Norris who had taken full advantage – he too had been overtaken by his team-mate Oscar Piastri.

As the two Brits battled on the outside of the first corner, that left the inside line free for Piastri to move into. And he took full advantage by roaring past both and showing strong pace in the opening stages of the Grand Prix.

He had built a gap to break the DRS barrier to Norris behind him, who was being hunted down by Hamilton. And this was all great news for Verstappen, who sped off into the distance and won the race by more than half-a-minute.

Norris got the better of his McLaren team-mate to finish second, while the charging Sergio Perez managed third ahead of Hamilton. Piastri, despite his excellent start, had to settle for fifth place, but the rookie earned plenty more admirers for another strong performance.

Daniel Moxon