Hamilton: No need for aggression in fight with Verstappen

Lewis Hamilton says there was no need to take any extra risks during his fight for victory with Max Verstappen in Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix as he kept the Formula 1 title picture in mind.

Hamilton fought back from 20 seconds behind to beat Verstappen to victory at the Hungaroring, making a pass around the outside at Turn 1 with four laps to go.

The pair had earlier enjoyed a wheel-to-wheel battle before Hamilton pitted for a second time, but the Briton said after the race he never wanted to be overly aggressive and squander his sizeable points advantage, with Verstappen still an outsider in the championship fight.

"Honestly, there really is no better feeling from a racing driver’s point of view, when you have a race like this and face a really strong competitor and a great driver like Max at their best," Hamilton said.

“Max is at his best and is continuing to perform great. It’s really comforting and really important to see the respect level between us. It was really respectful driving and I hope to continue that.

"When I got into second I was like ‘ok, this whole battle we’ve been talking about me having with Max, we are going to have that today’, and it was really awesome.

“He put the car in some really good places. I gave him space and more but that’s really just from a mindset that we are fighting slightly differently. If we were fighting on the same points, it may have been a lot more aggressive, but there was no need for that.

"It was really just about making sure that when you do finally pull off an overtaking manoeuvre that it was a clean, full sweep by."

Hamilton now sits 62 points clear in the drivers' championship heading into the summer break after winning eight of the first 12 races, with Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas standing as his closest challenger. Verstappen is a further seven points behind Bottas in third.