Hamilton “a broken record” as he urges Merc to copy Red Bull's “direction”

Red Bull stormed to a record-breaking 12th consecutive victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix, with Max Verstappen winning by over 30 seconds.

On the other hand, Hamilton could only finish fourth despite claiming his first F1 pole since the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

Speaking to Sky Sports after the race, Hamilton revealed that he’s called for Mercedes to focus their development direction around the floor area - like Red Bull have.

“We generally have a bigger wing than some of the others, like the Red Bulls for example, but they seem to have more downforce from their floor,” he said. “We have a lot of work to do. I am like a broken record.

“I’ve just gotta keep telling the guys ‘we need to go in that direction’. I would like to see that either with this year’s car or next year.”

Hamilton’s race was severely compromised by a subpar start from pole.

He ultimately dropped back behind the two McLarens after he was pushed wide by Verstappen.

“The start, actually the initial getaway wasn’t the worst I’ve ever had, but it obviously wasn’t as good as Max’s. I had a bit of wheelspin, and then obviously Max was on the inside and he ran me wide, and I got done by the two McLarens,” he added.

“So definitely not a great start, kind of reminiscent of 2015 when I fell back from first.

“Then after that I just didn’t have the pace to keep up with the guys. The balance of the car was pretty awful on that first stint. A lot of understeer, to snap oversteer, through corner balance – and I just couldn’t keep up with them.

“But then bit by bit as we got through the next couple of stints, the car started to become much more drivable, and then the last stint obviously was much better. If we had the pace we had at the end [earlier], we would have been a little bit better I think through the day.

“But I’m going to take the positives from yesterday. It was an amazing effort from the team to get to where we were and to beat everybody in qualifying was really spectacular for us. It shows while we don’t have the best car, it was an incredible lap, and we have a lot of work to do. 

“We’re a long way away from beating the Red Bull in a race and obviously now we’re behind the McLarens. We’ve just got to keep pushing.”