Wurzy's View of the Hungaroring

Posted on Wednesday 01 Aug 2007

My wife reckons Budapest is hot, full of chicks and great for buying duvets. Well, she might be right with all of those assumptions – not that I care that much for buying duvets. Much more interesting is the second point and of course she’s forgotten to mention the racetrack, which is very twisty, with no room for overtaking, no straight for rest, a big change in track conditions over the race weekend, the need for high downforce and lots of other important stuff.

Budapest is actually a pretty cool track, with lots of corners. It’s one of the places where you can actually drive the car in a slightly rude or aggressive way, especially once the track rubbers in.

There are a few good sections, but my favourite is on the back of the track, starting after the chicane with a left-right combination. The entry here is in third gear, just throwing the car into the apex of the left hander and keeping it quite tight from the apex to the exit. That’s quite an aggressive move for the car, but as soon as you have forced it to stay quite tight on the exit, you have to change direction quickly for the right-hander, which is in third as well. You hardly need to brake here – you can slow the car by sliding it, but if you do, you have to slide it precisely to the apex and then stamp the power down and hope the car has enough grip not to slide wide over the exit kerb.

After that section comes a flat left-hander, where you reach sixth on the exit. But there’s no rest after that: a very quick right-hander comes right up on you. All you need is a down-shift and a gentle dab on the brakes, then you throw the car in at really high speed – it’s a real joy, I can tell you. That corner is getting bloody quick now, especially once some rubber has built up on the track.

So, having just turned in to the right-hander, you wait to see what the car wants to do. Once the front has accepted that the driver is seriously forcing the poor old car around, then it’s time to put the pedal to the medal and steer the car out of the corner with the throttle.

I am sure we will have lots of fun in Budapest, trying to push laws of physics over the edge. Gents and chicks, we’re coming: Prepare for an awesome weekend!