We returned to the thrilling on-track action one last time before we are forced to realise our real-world responsibilities in the one-month-long summer break. The Hungarian Grand Prix has the reputation of being Monaco without the walls. However, it also happens to be Monaco without the scenic views and expensive yachts parked on the coast, which means you can’t cut to exotic views every time there is dead air on track. (And with Lando’s mom absent this weekend, it was bound to be a tough one for the TV directors.) McLaren’s pace seemed so superior that Max finally had to throw in the towel himself, struggling even more so in the car he has recently committed to being with for the next year.

I am useless. Nothing wrong with the car, car’s on pole. NEED TO CHANGE THE DRIVER.

The start of the qualifying session is more or less everything this season because Q3 only ends in one of the two ways. Aston Martin seemed super quick, while Ferrari seemed to have lost the pace they showed in practice, as both cars struggled to scrape through Q1 and Q2, while tough luck for Hamilton continued as he found himself out in Q2 with Kimi Antonelli. We waited forever to say it, and we thought we might never be able to, but Q3 saw Lance Stroll and Fernando Alonso challenging for pole as changing conditions threw a curveball to the entire order. A McLaren front row, however, still appeared undisputed until Leclerc pulled out a miracle from his hat, clinching the pole in his final run. A slower car ahead of the two McLarens is all we needed to make lap 1 interesting for the race on Sunday.

Ferrari, ahead of the two faster McLarens, gave us hope for a thrilling battle for the lead out of turn 1 and inevitable chaos on lap 1, after which we hope and pray for the gap between the frontrunners to come down for the remaining 69 laps of the race as the cars struggle to overtake. In a classic Norris fashion, he bit more than he could chew, going for an ambitious inside line for turn 1 but falling 2 positions behind. McLaren couldn’t challenge the pace of Ferrari in the first stint, and both of them went on different strategies to secure this win. Ferrari ‘Ferraried’ right in the final stint as the pace of Charles Leclerc fell off a cliff, the reasons of which remained unknown until the end of the race when Ferrari covered it off by claiming a damage to their chassis, which brought McLaren in play. In the final 5 laps as Oscar closed in on Lando and made the riskiest overtake attempt into turn 1, and that brought all of us to our feet. When the dust settled, it was Lando coming home in P1 ahead of Oscar with George Russell finishing the podium, capitalising on Leclerc’s damaged pace.

Championship on the table for two McLaren boys with Oscar in his ‘Villain Era’ and a memorable trip to Qatar on the table for lucky fans throught the OFF 2 QATAR Contest and Fan Championship Contest. Will the upgrades bring Ferrari in contention, can Red Bull finally be a two drvier team? How intense will be the McLaren battle moving on? So many questions to be answered when we return back from the Summer break. Intense competition, intense heat on and off-track and increased value of each single point lost or earned. So get ready to return to an intense ring of fire to decide the championship for the 2025 campaign and win a chance to experience a title deider unfold in front of your eyes!

We are halfway through the 2025 season, and McLaren seems to have secured both Championships comfortably. A 300-point lead in the constructor and almost a 100-point lead over Max Verstappen in the Driver’s championship, McLaren can even choose to skip a few races and enjoy themselves. Now that they find themselves alone on the top of the mountain, the intra-team battle intensifies as Lando and Oscar’s camp seems to be doing everything on and off-track to get the edge over the other. The scale seems to be balanced with a slight tilt towards Oscar Piastri as we go into the summer break. It is going to be a gloves-off battle between the two McLarens for the remaining 10 races of the season, and every point is going to matter that much more moving forward.

Going full McLaren mode for our fans, we are doing everything to help them bring prizes home and that’s why we are excited to announce the launch of Monthly Fan’s Championship!!! Apart from Off 2 Qatar and it’s fan championship, we now introduce Monthly Fan’s Championship starting from August 2025. Every month, from August to December, the top 5 users on the FC leaderboard will be rewarded big and the ultimate prize of them all, an exclusive motorsport memorabilia made by For 1 Studio.

Motosport has never been this rewarding but it now is, with Grid Master, take your racing weekend to the next level with actual stakes and prizes in the game. Experience some of the skin in the game thrill and rewarding prizes only by participating in Grid Master’s Monthly Fan’s Championship!

Toto Wolff has been drooling over Kimi Antonelli since the time he set his eyes on him, and it’s only a matter of time before he ends up adopting him. However, Toto finds himself in a difficult position as Kimi Antonelli seems to be struggling more and more in the recent races. After his blips of brilliance in the first part of the season, he seems to be struggling to extract the pace out of the car, and this seems to be taking a toll on his confidence, and the obvious question starts becoming even more highlighted of whether it was too soon to put Antonelli in that Mercedes. A few more of such performances from Antonelli and Toto’s out-of-the-world love and care would be insufficient to prevent him from a negative spiral, and he wouldn’t be able to help but think that parking Kimi in a Williams or Alpine for two years would have been the wiser choice than jumping the gun and putting him straight into Mercedes.

Fan of the Sidepod podcast? Would you like to hang out with the most awesome and fun bunch of our racing pundits? YOU CAN NOW! Join Grid Master and participate in the upcoming contests under the Off-2-Qatar campaign and get a chance to win a trip to Qatar with all the Sidepod members. Make this experience your most memorable racing experience yet and join our Sidepod members in the shrine of speed to witness the Championship battle unfold in front of your eyes!

HANGRY FOR HAMMERTIME

Presenting a brand new section of your much-loved newsletter, called DID YOU KNOW? A segment where we take random, interesting, shocking facts, trivia and stories, realising how they painted the motorsport world, how we now see and love!

The First Motorsport Race Had a Jazz Musician, a Swiss Baron, and a Thai Prince Among Its Competitors: At the inaugural Motorsport World Championship race in 1950, the competitors included Johnny Claes, a famous jazz musician, Baron Emmanuel 'Toulo' de Graffenried from Switzerland, and Prince Bira of Thailand