The Hungaroring circuit just outside Budapest has been on the F1 calendar uninterrupted for almost 40 years now, so it can fairly be called a classic race by now.

With a very tight and twisty layout and only one serious straight, qualifying and pit strategy are crucial here as overtaking on track is very difficult if not impossible.

But one change on F1 25 is that while you CAN run maximum downforce or close to it if you want (maybe good for online races), you don’t have to and just a high downforce setup can suffice, and you’ve got a few different routes you can go down with wing levels.

Here’s a general dry race setup for Hungary for a pad user:

• Wings – 36/38 or 46/48
• Diff – 10/55
• Camber/Toe – -2.50/-2.00/0.00/0.15 (LLL/0.15)
• Suspension – 41-3-14-10-22-49
• Brakes – 100% Pressure/55% Bias
• Tyre Pressures – Maximum all tyres

(update – I would now no longer recommend running 36/38 wings, but instead higher wings in the 40s like 44/46 or 46/48. I’m starting to find out how beneficial higher wings can be and analyzed it in detail in my CoTA setup guide, so I’m in process of revising my other setups here and at other traction heavy tracks like Baku, China, Miami, Bahrain etc).

More Setup Analysis & Tips

Wing levels

You can theoretically go in different directions here within reason, but it’s important to keep in mind defending against the AI in offline modes. For racing against the AI, I’d recommend wings between 35 and 40 to maintain some speed on the main straight for defending, with the standard 2 click spacing I use for better stability. Basically, for career mode, pick a wing level in this range that allows you to comfortably beat the time delta on the straights in your practice programmes.

However, if you’ve got confidence in your pace to pull away from chasing cars in sectors 2 and 3, OR you’re racing online, going up to 45 to 50 wing levels can be viable for better cornering performance. Just be aware that higher wings will make it harder on the main straight, so you’ll have to nail good exits out the final corner and use you ERS to punch away from chasing cars.

(update – After my recent discovery at CoTA, I now realize I should have gone with higher wings and will be doing next time here, using something like 42/44 or 44/46, since it’s now clear that the benefits of running higher downforce massively outweigh any loss in straight line speed, plus with only one main DRS zone that’s a threat, you can easily defend on that single straight with clever ERS usage. See my CoTA guide or template setup guide for more analysis of this.)

Key Video – You need higher wings when the tyres go off

 

Tyre Pressures

Tyre temps are more sensitive and critical on F1 25, and Hungary is one of those tracks where they overheat more easily because of the prolonged corners and traction zones. Therefore, it’s max pressures all tyres to keep the temps down. And even with max pressures, the red soft tyre can overheat quickly, so it’s not a good race tyre. The front right tyre overheats less than the others, so you reduce the pressure on this one a little. But the rest all need to be at maximum to keep temps under control. But putting all to max is the simpler setting.

Anti Roll Bars

There’s a crucial stability adjustment I had to make on this setup, by flipping the roll bar settings round to 14/10 for a more planted feel and easier traction round prolonged corners. Using my common 12/16 setting felt great over 1 lap on fresh tyres, but terrible when the tyres were just a few laps old. Need a more planted feel for easier corner exits or you start getting horrible wheelspin and instability come out of the slower corners.

More Aggressive Setup

My setups in general are more conservative and more about stability and easy traction over long runs. If you want something more aggressive for single lap pace, or just with faster potential performance, here’s some things you can tweak: a) raise front wing or even put it above the rear for sharper turn in, b) lower Off Throttle Diff for sharper rotation, c) remove the extra rear toe I added for geometry settings and just move everything back to LLLL, or d) go even more aggressive with the roll bar settings, using something like 10/21 or 12/21. All these tweaks will give potentially better/sharper cornering performance, but will make the car more unstable especially on worn tyres.

Intermediate Conditions

As soon as you get rain here, the traction starts getting really tricky. Increase the wing spacing to 4 clicks apart (so something like 36/40 wings) and raise you Off Throttle Diff to 60 to dampen rotation and make traction easier.

Full Wet Conditions

Heavy rain is even trickier, so I’d use 5 clicks spacing with the wings and bump them to max (so 45/50 wings), plus Off Throttle Diff to 60 or 65 to stop the car over-rotating and make traction easier on corner exit. Also raise the ride height 3-5 clicks front and rear, and also possibly swap the anti roll bar settings to something like 14/10 if you want a more planted feel.

Key wet weather tip – Rain is not uncommon in Hungary, but wet weather AI seem over-powered on this game, so I’d recommend bumping down the AI level 10-15 clicks from whatever feels comfortable in the dry for any wet sessions, otherwise the AI can be too fast and impossible to compete against.

Racing Tips For Hungary

Racing at Hungary is all about gaining, and then keeping, track position, so here’s a few extra tips in that regard.

Tricky Corners

There’s several traction zones at this track, but the two ones that really seem to stand out as being tricky as the tyres wear is turn 1 and the second to last corner (uphill left hand hairpin). You have to really moderate your turn in and be progressively more patient on the throttle as the rear tyres for these corners, or you’ll get those wheelspin moments that exacerbate the rear temps and wear issue.

ERS (Qualifying)

Got loads of ERS Overtake to use on flying laps here, so much that’s it’s actually hard to use all your deployment. Use Overtake all through the sector 1 straights and on any other straights you can during the rest of the lap to boost acceleration. Keep an eye on the yellow meter and aim to fully deplete it just as you finish a flying lap.

Defending and ERS Use (Race)

Overtaking is hard at Hungary, but the AI will give it a good go on the main straight with their ERS and DRS. To ward them off, you’ll need to a) make sure you get smooth exits out of the penultimate and last corner; and b) use your ERS all the way along the pit straight if the car behind has DRS, but don’t use it the rest of the lap to let it recharge and just repeat this lap after lap if defending.

Tyre Wear/Pit Strategy

Here are the wear rates I found for the 3 tyres:

• Soft – 7% per lap
• Medium – 4% per lap
• Hard – 3% per lap

The soft tyre did not feel like a great race tyre for me, traction started getting really hard really quickly, even with my stability focused setup. If you’ve got a new set of them and you’re smooth on traction, you might be able to squeeze a 3-5 lap stint out of them for 25% races. But realistically, a medium-hard strategy is probably going to be the better one for most players even for 25% races, and 50% races are likely a 2 stop using the mediums and hard (MHH) unless you’re very good on tyre wear.

(key update – using higher wings in the 40s will really make it a LOT easier to control the traction as the tyres start to wear, so that’s now the recommended route).

Tyre deg is high at Hungary so the undercut can work if you take advantage of the initial pace of fresh tyres and put some strong outlaps in. Pitting 1-2 laps early can help you jump a few cars ahead and also give you a few seconds breathing space against a car that was constantly pestering you with DRS before. With overtaking being so difficult round here, your best way to make up places is definitely through the pit stops and clever strategy.