2006 Hungarian Grand Prix

The bottom 6 teams in the 2005 Constructors' Championship and Super Aguri were entitled to run a third car in free practice on Friday. These drivers drove on Friday but did not compete in qualifying or the race. Fabrizio del Monte was originally announced as Midland's third driver.^[6]

During Friday practice Fernando Alonso was given a two-second qualifying penalty by the stewards for dangerous driving and overtaking under a yellow flag condition.^[7] This meant that two seconds would be added to his times in each part of qualifying. Christijan Albers was given a ten-place grid penalty for an engine change, his second in as many weekends. Jenson Button received the same penalty after having an engine change when his let go in the final practice session.^[8]

In a similar situation to Alonso's penalty, Michael Schumacher was given a two-second penalty for overtaking Robert Kubica and Alonso under "red flag" conditions at the end of Saturday's last free practice session. The decision left Schumacher "fuming," with him saying "I blame myself partly for what did happen, but I didn't expect this kind of penalty."^[9]

In qualifying, Kimi Räikkönen achieved pole position with a time of 1:19.599 seconds. Felipe Massa qualified second, with Rubens Barrichello starting the race in third.^[10]

The track was wet at the start of the race, making it the first wet Hungarian Grand Prix. All drivers started the race on intermediate tyres with the exception of Barrichello, who was on wets. Polesitter Kimi Räikkönen took the lead early on. Alonso and Schumacher made their way through the field with Schumacher up into 6th place from 11th into the first corner, and Alonso climbing from 15th place with a spectacular first hard-fought lap. He went on to pass Schumacher on the outside of turn 5 after a straight fight for several laps and reached 3rd place. He then took the lead after the McLarens of Pedro de la Rosa and Räikkönen pitted. Bridgestone wet-tyres used to dictate the field in non-dry conditions but today it seemed a one-off for the Japanese rubber. All Bridgestone-drivers, including the Ferraris, were seen struggling and seriously down on pace compared to their competitors. Schumacher fell right back in the clutches of Giancarlo Fisichella and lost his front wing battling for 5th place, hitting the Italian mid-corner fighting off snap-oversteer. This forced the German to pit, going a lap down. Soon after Jenson Button overtook Massa, Fisichella and Schumacher in just under the space of 2 laps. Räikkönen struggled on his second set of tyres and ended up crashing into the back of Vitantonio Liuzzi's Toro Rosso, vaulting the car and bringing out the safety car. Alonso then pitted, allowing Schumacher to get back on the lead lap. Another beneficiary of the safety car was Jenson Button, who decided not to pit during the safety car period and climbed up to 2nd place behind Alonso. After the period was over Button began to challenge Alonso, but soon had to pit for fuel. Alonso led, but after a pitstop for dry tyres his right-rear wheel nut detached, causing the Spaniard to lose control and crash. Button inherited the lead and was never challenged from then on. Schumacher made his way up to 2nd by staying on intermediate tyres as others around him pitted for dry weather ones, but this gamble backfired as the cars on drys caught him in the final laps. Schumacher defended his position, including controversially cutting a chicane on consecutive laps without penalty,^[11] but Pedro de la Rosa and Nick Heidfeld both ultimately passed him. Whilst he was being overtaken Schumacher banged wheels with Heidfeld, damaging his Ferrari's suspension and forcing him out of the race three laps short of the finish.

Button won the race despite beginning in 14th place through relentless driving with de la Rosa scoring his only career's podium with second place, and Heidfeld getting BMW Sauber's first podium with 3rd.^[12] Debutant driver Robert Kubica finished in seventh place and would have scored two points, but was later disqualified as his car was found to be underweight due to excessive tyre wear.^[13] This coincidentally meant that Michael Schumacher earned a point despite not finishing, as he was elevated to 8th place in the final results.^[13]

In a 2020 watch along of the race on Sky Sports F1 with Jenson Button, Anthony Davidson and Andrew Shovlin then BBC Radio 5 Live Formula One commentator David Croft said "In the BBC 5 live commentary box in my first season in Formula One after starting the day doing a piece on our breakfast show where they said has Jenson Button got any chance of winning and I said no, no chance what so ever. At this stage (15 laps to go) I'm getting irked because they keep asking me to get a score flash for the football or the rugby or the cricket as used to do on 5 Live and I'm like no we got to stick with this Jenson Button can win this race and they finally came over into the talkback, my producer saying no more interruptions Crofty, take it to the chequered flag, bring him home."^[14]

Notes

• ^1 – Jenson Button and Christijan Albers both received a ten-place grid penalty because of earlier engine changes.
• ^2 – The Grand Prix stewards declared that Scott Speed had impeded another driver during the qualifying session, and penalised him by deleting his three fastest qualifying times. His qualifying time became 1:23.005 instead of 1:22.317, setting him one position back on the grid.
• ^3 – Fernando Alonso and Michael Schumacher both had two seconds added to their lap times for each part of qualifying; the times shown here include the two-second penalties.

Notes

• ^1 – Kubica originally finished seventh, but was disqualified after the race, as his car was 2 kg underweight at the end of the race due to excessive tyre wear.^[13]

• Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.
• Bold text and an asterisk indicates competitors who still had a theoretical chance of becoming World Champion.

ITV's coverage of this race won a BAFTA in 2006, in the category "Best Sport". The awards took place May 20, 2007.^[18]

• 2006 Hungaroring GP2 Series round

• Race report at the BBC

47°34′44″N 19°14′55″E / 47.57889°N 19.24861°E / 47.57889; 19.24861