It is a long-standing matter of humour in the Formula 1 paddock that the “possible race strategies” infographic Pirelli circulates on Sunday mornings often bears no relationship at all to the way the race pans out.
So it proved at the Hungaroring as Lando Norris ended up being effectively forced onto an unfavoured one-stop strategy after a poor start, only for it to work in his favour. And he wasn’t the only one – Max Verstappen could have finished fifth or six rather than ninth, reckoned Red Bull driver advisor Helmut Marko, if he had stopped once rather than twice.
