Revealed: The Max Verstappen tow which boosted Lando Norris to Hungarian GP pole

Lando Norris behind Max Verstappen

Lando Norris took pole position in the Hungarian F1 GP by just 22 thousandths of a second.

The McLaren driver beat his team-mate Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen with a great final sector. However, the British driver had a little ‘help’ that could have made the difference in his fastest lap.

Max Verstappen tow uncovered behind Lando Norris pole

Lando Norris took his second pole position of the season ahead of Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen. The differences were minimal between the three drivers and, especially, between both McLaren team-mates and rivals. Lando Norris had extra top speed in the main straight which gave him an early advantage.

Norris had +5km/h more top speed than Piastri: 313 km/h against 308km/h on the main straight. The Australian was ahead of Norris in most parts of both drivers’ laps, but again Norris made the difference in the last two corners where he gained more traction and beat his team-mate for pole for just 0.022s.

Perhaps this better final sector by Norris was caused because he managed his tyres better throughout Sector 2 in order to have better grip at the final stages of his lap.

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Why Norris’ top speed advantage over Piastri? Nothing more and nothing less than a slipstream from Max Verstappen. The Dutch driver was the first to complete his Q3 lap while Norris and Piastri were still in their outlap.

Norris found himself on the main straight with Verstappen finishing his lap and managed to take advantage of Verstappen’s tow for a few metres.

The Red Bull driver immediately pulled away and reduced his speed as soon as he noticed Norris on his rear view mirrors. A situation that went unnoticed by the cameras on the broadcast, but which could have been decisive in the final result of qualifying.

Despite this speed advantage, Norris was not faster than Verstappen in the first sector. The RB20’s high straight-line aerodynamic efficiency remains one of its greatest strengths with Verstappen reaching 316 km/h.

But the slipstreaming provided to Norris has balanced the scales by reducing the MCL38’s weak point, which is precisely high drag on the straights.

In fact, the behaviour of the RB20 and the MCL38 was completely different on the short Hungaroring circuit.

While the Red Bull was quicker on the straights and in the high-speed corners, the McLaren excelled in the slower corners and, especially, in the final sector. Norris had much better traction, which made the difference in the end thanks to a less overheated tyre at the end of his first Q3 flying lap.

As we can see, Verstappen clearly dominated Sector 1, opening a gap of just under a tenth and a half of a second. Norris managed to close the gap in the chicane at turns 6 and 7 to equal things up. And finally, the Briton struck the final blow to take pole in Sector 3 by just a few thousandths of a second over Piastri and Verstappen himself.

As expected, there was another good fight between McLaren and Red Bull with the Papaya team being the winner this time. However, the points will be handed out tomorrow and Norris and Piastri will have to work as a team to hold off Verstappen.

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