The 1989 Hungarian Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Hungaroring on 13 August 1989. It was the tenth race of the 1989 Formula One World Championship.
The 77-lap race was won by Nigel Mansell, driving a Ferrari. After qualifying only 12th, Mansell charged through the field and took the lead with an opportunistic overtaking manoeuvre on Ayrton Senna in the McLaren-Honda as the two were lapping Stefan Johansson in the Onyx-Ford. Senna finished 26 seconds behind Mansell, with Thierry Boutsen third in a Williams-Renault.
Senna's teammate and Drivers' Championship rival, Alain Prost, finished fourth, meaning that his lead over Senna in the championship was reduced to 14 points.
Qualifying Pre-qualifying report The Hungaroring had been changed from the year before; the tight, slow S-bends at Turns 3, 4 and 5 had been changed in character and bypassed. Turn 3 remained, but was now taken much faster as what were Turns 4 and 5 were bypassed, thus extending the straight now from Turn 3 into the new Turns 4 and 5; raising the circuit's average speed by 10 percent.
In the Friday morning pre-qualifying session, an Onyx topped the time sheets for the fourth Grand Prix in succession. Stefan Johansson was comfortably fastest, and his team-mate Bertrand Gachot also pre-qualified in fourth. Both drivers had re-signed with Onyx for 1990. For the first time this season, Piercarlo Ghinzani went through to the main qualifying sessions, in second place. For the third time this season, and for the first time since the US Grand Prix, he outpaced his Osella team-mate Nicola Larini, who missed out in fifth position. The Larrousse-Lola of Michele Alboreto was the other pre-qualifier in third, the Italian suffering from a cracked rib. His team-mate Philippe Alliot was down in sixth, the first time either he or a Larrousse-Lamborghini had failed to pre-qualify.
The AGS cars of Yannick Dalmas and Gabriele Tarquini were seventh and ninth respectively, while Zakspeed drivers Bernd Schneider and Aguri Suzuki, still hampered by their underpowered V8 Yamaha engines, were eighth and twelfth. Roberto Moreno was tenth in the Coloni, while his team-mate Pierre-Henri Raphanel was unable to post a representative time and was bottom of the time sheets in his last appearance for the team. Gregor Foitek was still unable to pre-qualify the new EuroBrun car, and was eleventh fastest.
Pre-qualifying classification Pos No Driver Constructor Time Gap 1 36 Stefan Johansson Onyx-Ford 1:22.836 — 2 18 Piercarlo Ghinzani Osella-Ford 1:24.086 +1.250 3 29 Michele Alboreto Lola-Lamborghini 1:24.323 +1.487 4 37 Bertrand Gachot Onyx-Ford 1:24.412 +1.576 5 17 Nicola Larini Osella-Ford 1:24.601 +1.765 6 30 Philippe Alliot Lola-Lamborghini 1:24.928 +2.092 7 41 Yannick Dalmas AGS-Ford 1:25.571 +2.735 8 34 Bernd Schneider Zakspeed-Yamaha 1:25.613 +2.777 9 40 Gabriele Tarquini AGS-Ford 1:25.685 +2.849 10 31 Roberto Moreno Coloni-Ford 1:26.903 +4.067 11 33 Gregor Foitek EuroBrun-Judd 1:27.478 +4.642 12 35 Aguri Suzuki Zakspeed-Yamaha 1:28.113 +5.277 13 32 Pierre-Henri Raphanel Coloni-Ford 1:45.971 +22.135
Qualifying report Riccardo Patrese took a surprise pole position in his Williams-Renault, the first and only non-McLaren-Honda pole of the season, beating Ayrton Senna by three-tenths of a second. It was only the third pole of Patrese's career and his first since the 1983 Italian Grand Prix. It was also the first pole position for the Renault V10 engine.
In another surprise, Alex Caffi took third in his Dallara-Ford-Cosworth, just six-tenths behind Senna, with Thierry Boutsen fourth in the second Williams-Renault. Drivers' Championship leader Alain Prost was fifth in the second McLaren-Honda, with Gerhard Berger sixth in the V12 Ferrari. The top ten was completed by Alessandro Nannini in the Benetton-Ford, Stefano Modena in the Brabham-Judd, Derek Warwick in the Arrows Ford-Cosworth and Pierluigi Martini in the Minardi Ford-Cosworth.
Nigel Mansell could only manage 12th in the second Ferrari, nearly seven-tenths behind teammate Berger and over two seconds behind Patrese, and later complained of traffic. After realising that he would not crack the top 10 in qualifying, Mansell instead used final qualifying to work on his race set up, something he hoped would pay dividends on race day.
Qualifying classification Pos No Driver Constructor Q1 Q2 Gap 1 6 Riccardo Patrese Williams-Renault 1:19.726 1:20.644 — 2 1 Ayrton Senna McLaren-Honda 1:21.576 1:20.039 +0.313 3 21 Alex Caffi Dallara-Ford 1:21.040 1:20.704 +0.978 4 5 Thierry Boutsen Williams-Renault 1:23.492 1:21.001 +1.275 5 2 Alain Prost McLaren-Honda 1:21.076 1:22.267 +1.350 6 28 Gerhard Berger Ferrari 1:21.304 1:21.270 +1.544 7 19 Alessandro Nannini Benetton-Ford 1:21.448 1:21.301 +1.575 8 8 Stefano Modena Brabham-Judd 1:23.090 1:21.472 +1.746 9 9 Derek Warwick Arrows-Ford 1:23.111 1:21.617 +1.891 10 23 Pierluigi Martini Minardi-Ford 1:21.746 1:32.546 +2.020 11 4 Jean Alesi Tyrrell-Ford 1:23.853 1:21.799 +2.073 12 27 Nigel Mansell Ferrari 1:22.544 1:21.951 +2.225 13 15 Maurício Gugelmin March-Judd 1:22.949 1:22.083 +2.357 14 16 Ivan Capelli March-Judd 1:22.445 1:22.088 +2.362 15 7 Martin Brundle Brabham-Judd 1:22.970 1:22.296 +2.570 16 10 Eddie Cheever Arrows-Ford 1:23.251 1:22.374 +2.648 17 11 Nelson Piquet Lotus-Judd 1:22.837 1:22.406 +2.680 18 22 Andrea de Cesaris Dallara-Ford 1:23.463 1:22.410 +2.684 19 3 Jonathan Palmer Tyrrell-Ford 1:24.670 1:22.578 +2.852 20 12 Satoru Nakajima Lotus-Judd 1:23.996 1:22.630 +2.904 21 37 Bertrand Gachot Onyx-Ford 1:22.634 1:23.720 +2.908 22 18 Piercarlo Ghinzani Osella-Ford 1:23.091 1:22.763 +3.037 23 24 Luis Pérez-Sala Minardi-Ford 1:23.017 1:24.188 +3.291 24 36 Stefan Johansson Onyx-Ford 1:23.372 1:23.148 +3.422 25 20 Emanuele Pirro Benetton-Ford 1:23.772 1:23.399 +3.673 26 29 Michele Alboreto Lola-Lamborghini 1:23.733 1:25.660 +4.007 27 25 René Arnoux Ligier-Ford 1:25.862 1:24.003 +4.277 28 26 Olivier Grouillard Ligier-Ford 1:24.702 1:25.169 +4.976 29 38 Christian Danner Rial-Ford 1:26.485 1:25.017 +5.291 30 39 Volker Weidler Rial-Ford 1:28.112 1:26.320 +6.594
Race Race report At the start of the race, Patrese, Senna and Caffi maintained their grid order into turn 1, while Boutsen lost out to Prost as Berger passed both of them. Further back, Mansell made a good start, rising to 8th at the first corner. It soon became clear, however, that Caffi was struggling, the Dallara unable to replicate the speed it had shown in qualifying. Before long he had been passed by both Berger and Prost, and was holding up a train of cars consisting of Boutsen, Nannini, Mansell and Warwick.
Nannini exited the train when he pulled in to change tyres. This promoted Mansell to 7th, which he quickly turned into 5th by passing Boutsen and Caffi in quick succession. He then set about closing the 17-second gap to the leaders, and was promoted to 4th when Berger pitted for tyres. Having caught up to the leading group, Mansell passed Prost for 3rd. Patrese's Williams then began to develop a problem with a holed radiator, which slowed him and bunched up the leading group. Eventually, Patrese's holed radiator became so bad that both Senna and Mansell were able to pass him in the space of a few corners. Patrese retired from the race shortly afterwards.
Mansell now began to pressure Senna, clearly faster but unable to pass due to the extra power of the McLaren's Honda engine. Meanwhile, Prost pitted for tyres and rejoined 6th, while Berger only inherited 3rd briefly before he retired with gearbox problems, leaving Senna and Mansell on their own. Eventually, the pair came up to lap Stefan Johansson's Onyx. Senna caught him at an awkward moment, just at the accelerating zone out of turn 3. The Brazilian uncharacteristically hesitated, briefly lifting off, and this allowed Mansell to draw alongside as they went past Johansson and then use the Ferrari's greater momentum to surge past Senna and take the lead. After that, Mansell had an unchallenged run to the flag, beating Senna by nearly 26 seconds, with Boutsen completing the podium. Prost overtook Eddie Cheever's Arrows for 4th on the final lap, while Nelson Piquet's Lotus rounded off the points scorers."Mansell the magician" by Innes Ireland Road & Track December 1989
Many of the leading cars had problems with tyre vibrations - both Senna and Mansell complained about this, whilst Prost also had difficulties after picking up debris whilst going offline to avoid Patrese's oil.Murray's Walker 1989 Grand Prix Year, First Frost 1989, p.92
Race classification Pos No Driver Constructor Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 27 Nigel Mansell Ferrari 77 1:49:38.650 12 9 2 1 Ayrton Senna McLaren-Honda 77 + 25.967 2 6 3 5 Thierry Boutsen Williams-Renault 77 + 38.354 4 4 4 2 Alain Prost McLaren-Honda 77 + 44.177 5 3 5 10 Eddie Cheever Arrows-Ford 77 + 45.106 16 2 6 11 Nelson Piquet Lotus-Judd 77 + 1:12.039 17 1 7 21 Alex Caffi Dallara-Ford 77 + 1:24.225 3 8 20 Emanuele Pirro Benetton-Ford 76 + 1 Lap 25 9 4 Jean Alesi Tyrrell-Ford 76 + 1 Lap 11 10 9 Derek Warwick Arrows-Ford 76 + 1 Lap 9 11 8 Stefano Modena Brabham-Judd 76 + 1 Lap 8 12 7 Martin Brundle Brabham-Judd 75 + 2 Laps 15 13 3 Jonathan Palmer Tyrrell-Ford 73 + 4 Laps 19 24 Luis Pérez-Sala Minardi-Ford 57 Collision 23 28 Gerhard Berger Ferrari 56 Gearbox 6 6 Riccardo Patrese Williams-Renault 54 Radiator 1 36 Stefan Johansson Onyx-Ford 48 Gearbox 24 19 Alessandro Nannini Benetton-Ford 46 Gearbox 7 37 Bertrand Gachot Onyx-Ford 38 Gearbox 21 12 Satoru Nakajima Lotus-Judd 33 Collision 20 15 Maurício Gugelmin March-Judd 27 Electrical 13 16 Ivan Capelli March-Judd 26 Wheel 14 29 Michele Alboreto Lola-Lamborghini 26 Engine 26 18 Piercarlo Ghinzani Osella-Ford 20 Electrical 22 23 Pierluigi Martini Minardi-Ford 19 Wheel 10 22 Andrea de Cesaris Dallara-Ford 0 Clutch 18 25 René Arnoux Ligier-Ford 26 Olivier Grouillard Ligier-Ford 38 Christian Danner Rial-Ford 39 Volker Weidler Rial-Ford 17 Nicola Larini Osella-Ford 30 Philippe Alliot Lola-Lamborghini 41 Yannick Dalmas AGS-Ford 34 Bernd Schneider Zakspeed-Yamaha 40 Gabriele Tarquini AGS-Ford 31 Roberto Moreno Coloni-Ford 33 Gregor Foitek EuroBrun-Judd 35 Aguri Suzuki Zakspeed-Yamaha 32 Pierre-Henri Raphanel Coloni-Ford
Championship standings after the race
Drivers' Championship standings PosDriverPoints 1 Alain Prost 56 2 Ayrton Senna 42 3 Nigel Mansell 34 4 Riccardo Patrese 25 5 Thierry Boutsen 17Source:
Constructors' Championship standings Pos Constructor Points 1 McLaren-Honda98 2 Williams-Renault42 3 Ferrari34 4 Benetton-Ford17 5 Arrows-Ford11Source:
References