Dangerous heatwaves are blasting large areas of Europe this week bringing temperatures in the high 40s. But the Hungarian Grand Prix will be spared those brutal highs.
F1 could instead see another rain-affected event. If so, that may complicate F1’s planned test of its new ‘Alternative Tyre Allocation’ rules.The strongest chance of drivers facing a wet track is on Friday, with thundery showers expected at the Hungaroring in the afternoon and at the end of the day. With an 80% chance of rain in the afternoon, both first and second practice could be affected.
On Saturday the threat of rain will drop to just 20%, which may come as a relief to drivers after a string of rain-affected qualifying sessions. Qualifying in Spain began on a wet track and Canada saw another soggy session. More rain complicated matters in Austria and qualifying started wet and finished dry last time out at Silverstone. That means the F1 has had rain-impacted Saturdays for the last four rounds.
If rain does interfere with qualifying it will prevent F1 from using its new Alternate Tyre Allocation rule being fully implemented. The ATA dictates the tyre compound that has to be used in each segment of qualifying. Unless the track is declared wet, the ATA rules means teams will have to use the hard compound in Q1, mediums in Q2 and then softs in Q3.
When it is sunny, the Hungaroring is susceptible to high track temperatures with F1 due to its late July race date. But last season the maximum track temperature during its grand prix weekend was actually only the 20th highest of the 22 circuits on the calendar.
The air temperature this Friday is expected to be 26C and 27C for the two practice sessions, which may sound hot but is actually cooler than the majority of tracks visited so far this year. Saturday will see similar temperatures and qualifying is expected to take place in 28C conditions.
Race day in Hungary is set to be the driest, warmest and sunniest of the weekend. Track temperatures will likely to be 10C or so higher than the 29C air temperature predicted for the race, and the 3pm start time means the race should end in similar conditions to the start of qualifying.
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For more updates on the track conditions during each session keep an eye on RaceFans Live and the RaceFans Twitter account.
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asd
20th July 2023, 9:08
Rain is the only thing that can save a GP on this abomination of a racing track. I’m looking forward to it ;)
BasCB (@bascb)
20th July 2023, 11:22
I hope it does. Really not seeing the “benefit” of this change at all.
Jere (@jerejj)
20th July 2023, 9:37
Mostly only in Southern Europe, though, & 40 at maximum (in two places I checked with 30s elsewhere) rather than high-40s, but relevantly for the Hungarian GP, if Saturday is yet again rain-affected (despite low-ish likelihood presently), I can’t really think of anything other than weather gods knowing what Saturday’s feature track action in F1, given how many race weekend Saturday’s have had at least a little rain post-Miami GP.
BasCB (@bascb)
20th July 2023, 11:24
Southern Europe, including most of France, south Germany, Czechia, Slovakia and Hungary so far @jerejj. Sure, haven’t had 40s yet, but it’s been about a month of more or less consistent 27-36 temperatures and only a few storms with local flooding in between.
Jere (@jerejj)
20th July 2023, 11:51
@bascb Geographically, Southern Europe more or less only covers locations within the Mediterranean climate zone, but more relevantly to being specific about what constitutes Southern Europe by definition, yes, some Central European (& Paris earlier this summer) locations have also received mid-30s figures occasionally, but more so those in the Mediterranean climate zone, with at least Rome & Athens getting 40 once in recent days.
Overall, this summer definitely hasn’t been as warm on average in Europe as last year’s.
Peter707
20th July 2023, 12:43
Resident of Budapest here. Last two weeks were indeed hot, but not really exceptional, no records broken or else, temperature reached 35 degrees on a few days, most recently on Monday, gradually getting cooler since then.
Jockey Ewing
20th July 2023, 13:40
Yes, it is a bit colder summer here than the most extreme ones from the recent 5-10 years. Also it started a bit later than usual. Apart from the hottest cities, many rural locations were consistently around or at most 30 Celsius, the colder locations were consistently below 30 (when measured as the met stations used to do, so no direct sunlight for eg). So 35 at Budapest, but such cities have a large heat island effect. Based on this pattern this year, I think going above 35 Celsius this weekend will be unlikely for a non-city location.
A few days before there was an extreme thunderstorm where I live, an adjacent country to the GP’s location. Interesting, as winds-wise this place is very calm and mild. It was the most brutal one I have ever seen, and even most of the elderly agree with it. Visibility distance was something like 20-30 meters, wind 70-100kmh, and a rainfall of 40mm in half an hour. It felt so tropical, the rain was so dense that it almost looked like white fog, but with really violent winds. So many nice trees were taken down by it, even older than a century giants. I think it was not far from making some cars fly.
Jockey Ewing
20th July 2023, 14:54
… adjacent county…
BLS (@brightlampshade)
20th July 2023, 12:39
So if it’s a drying track in Q1 anyone taking the risk for dry tyres will have to gamble with the hards?
tielemst
20th July 2023, 12:52
Leave it to Checo to deliver something spectacular.
János
20th July 2023, 14:38
So I expect it to be raining between the sessions and a bone dry track in FP1, FP2, FP3, Qualifying and race…
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
20th July 2023, 23:26
Exactly, such a joke in silverstone.
AlexS
23rd July 2023, 1:23
Fake news.
ESA yes that European Space Agency has the bright idea or the manipulative idea most probably of releasing terrain temperatures as if they were atmospheric temperatures the usual values.
Since journalists only investigate what they don’t agree with we have fake news by major media.