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The twenty-seventh Hungaroring/ Exclusive from Petr Minarik/photo J.Křenek

The Hungarian Hungaroring will host the eleventh race of this year's F1 Championship. The first race at this circuit, about 20 km far from Budapest, was in 1986, however the Danube city saw its first GP 50 years before that. Then, a five-kilometer circuit was built in the Budapest park, shaped like a number eight, where the complete racing elite gathered and where Tazio Nuvolari won (Auto Union).

Hungaroring itself was 4,014 m long at its premiere, but with its profile and the fine sand blown all over, it didn't get much excitement among the drivers. On the contrary. As soon as three years later it was modified, and then again in 2003. So the current circuit, relatively flat track (the difference between the highest and lowest point is 367 m), it's 4,381 m long and has 14 corners (eight right, six left). Its width oscillates between 11 and 14 metres, needs high grip, the drivers change gears about 52 times and can go 57 per cent at full gas. The fastest place is the end of the final straight, where the drivers reach the speed 302 kph. The first corner is - together with the last but one corner - the slowest one: it's taken in the second gear at about 95 kph. And that is also the place where the most overtaking manoeuvres are done. One lap takes about 2.2 litre of fuel from the tank.

The first winner on this circuit, where the highest g is reached in the corner 5 (3 g), was Nelson Piquet but since then there have been another 14 winners. The most frequent was Michael Schumacher (4 times) who could be considered the king of the Hungarian GP. Apart from the victories he won also the most podiums (7) and spend also the most laps in the lead (1,215). Among the cars the leader is McLaren. They won the most victories (10), and together with Ferrari also pole positions (7) and the most podiums (21). The Woking car's drivers also collected the most points (229) and spend the most time leading (2,751 km). Only the number of the fastest laps belongs to a different team: Williams (9). As far as the engines are concerned the most successful team at the Danube is Renault, leading all kinds of statistics, they only share the number of victories with Mercedes (both 7).

Last year Jenson Button triumphed in Budapest, before Sabastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso. Alonso was on the podium in the second place also the year before. However, the Maranello team celebrated victory here last time in 2005, when the red car was driven by Michael Schumacher. Red Bull got its one Hungarian victory two years ago thanks to Webber, while the last victory for Williams was long 15 years ago (Jacques Villeneuve). And what about the other current teams? Johnny Herbert won the top standing for Sauber in 1997. Last year the teams to get their best standings were Toro Rosso (Buemi 8th), Mercedes (Rosberg 9th) and Force India (di Resta 7th) and two years ago Hispania Racing (Senna 17th). The situation is complicated in case of Lotus, who has two followers. But in Hungary not even the original Lotus ever won: Ayrton Senna was the second twice (1986 and 1987) and he got the pole position in 1986...

So we will see what this circuit, for which the Hungarians got the envy of the complete east Europe in the middle of the 80s and which is, next to Hockenheimring, the nearest for our visitors, will bring this time. One thing is clear, if one of the McLaren's drivers won, it would be their third victory at Hungaroring and it would put them close behind the so far ruling Schumacher. But can the Woking team, which fell through to the fourth place in the constructors table, think about something like that?