Max Verstappen races to the podium after pre-race crash

Max Verstappen completed a surprising second on Sunday in a Hungarian Formula One Grand Prix he had feared is likely to be over earlier than the beginning after he crashed his Red Bull on the best way to the grid.

The Dutch 22-year-old had arrived in Budapest from Austria as the person most probably to take the struggle to dominant Mercedes however it didn’t look that approach because the clock ticked right down to lights out.

Seventh in qualifying, Verstappen practically didn’t even make it so far as his allotted slot.

He skidded off at flip 12 on a humid and slippery monitor as he headed from storage to grid, crunching into the tyre barrier and smashing the entrance wing.

“I was already struggling the whole lap for grip and then basically just locked up and I couldn’t get out of it so I just went straight into the wall,” he defined.

“I thought the race was over but I managed to reverse the car out of the wall. And yeah, it’s like a ‘never give up’ mentality, still.

“Bring the car to the grid and see what happens, right? I could have jumped out there and said ‘it’s over’ but… the mechanics, they did an amazing job to repair that car and I was just very happy to start the race.”

Mechanics swarmed across the Red Bull, some operating again to the storage for a brand new wing whereas others labored feverishly on the entrance left suspension.

Verstappen in the meantime walked away to hitch the opposite drivers for the nationwide anthem.

“I was very calm. I was like ‘let’s see if they are going to make it’ and if not then that’s it, that’s the race done, and the whole disappointing weekend would have been completed, you know,” he mentioned.

“But they did an amazing job, so I was really fired up to get back in the car and show them that the effort was not for nothing… it was a crazy 10 to 12 minutes.”

While Valtteri Bottas tousled his entrance row begin, Verstappen raced up and into second behind the Finn’s Mercedes group mate Lewis Hamilton, the pole sitter and eventual winner who was at all times out of attain.

“To be able to split the two Mercedes cars in the race after such a difficult weekend for us is a great result and something we definitely didn’t expect,” mentioned Verstappen.