MOTOR SPORT HUNGARIAN GRAND PRIX PREVIEW:RED BULL Racing's Sebastian Vettel laid down an impressive marker ahead of this afternoon's qualifying session for the Hungarian Grand Prix, lapping almost half a second quicker than nearest challenger Fernando Alonso in practice sessions totally dominated by the Austrian team.

Having shaded the morning session by a tenth of a second from team-mate Mark Webber but a full second in front of Renault’s Robert Kubica, Vettel upped the ante in the afternoon, firing in a blistering lap of 1:20.087 with half an hour of the session left to leave himself a half second up on Webber.

A late flying lap by Alonso saw the Ferrari driver dive under that gap by three thousandths of a second but the message coming from the opening hostilities in Budapest is that after under-performing in Germany, where Vettel was eclipsed at the start by the Ferraris of Alonso and Felipe Massa and Webber struggled to sixth with engine problems, this season’s quickest team are going quicker again.

“I wouldn’t say that,” said Vettel when asked if Red Bull were in a different league to rivals at the Hungaroring. “The Ferraris seemed very quick again, not just on short runs but also on the longer run, so I think they will be very quick again tomorrow. You cannot forget the McLarens.”

Red Bull Racing have given cause for optimism to rivals with occasionally sluggish Fridays before but seem to find another gear in qualifying, in which they team has scored 10 poles from 11 outings. Alonso, though, was hopeful he could get closer to Vettel when battle begins in earnest this afternoon.

“Today we had some slower pace than Red Bull over one timed lap, but we need to see also the conditions they were running and the conditions we were running,” he said. “You never know; we had some traffic in the important laps as well. We remain confident the difference is not as big as it seems, but obviously they seem stronger than Hockenheim.

“So we know we need to do something good tonight if we want to fight for pole position tomorrow.”

Red Bull’s renewed dominance stems partly from the Hungaroring circuit itself. With just one major straight bookended by sequences of tight, slow corners, the track places no premium on high speed and largely negates the 30bhp deficit Red Bull have claimed for their Renault engine. It also minimises the effect of the F-duct which boosts straight line speed. Couple that with the Red Bull car’s superb grip and handling. For rivals the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend represents a perfect storm of circumstances favouring Vettel and Webber.

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton admitted as much, saying his team could get nowhere near the pace of the front runners despite his car being “the best he had ever had around this track”.

“We’re massively down – almost a second – in the middle sector, and then a couple of tenths in the first and last sectors,” he said after finishing sixth yesterday. “We are pushing, and we’re doing the best job we can. I guess this weekend’s just about scoring as many points as we can and hoping the guys ahead have troubles.”

Ninth-placed team-mate Jenson Button was equally pessimistic, the defending champion saying, “The Red Bull is just so fast. There’s still more to improve,” he added, “but we’re never going to find a second.”

The situation was worse for Mercedes. With 10th-placed Michael Schumacher admitting his car was uncompetitive over both long and short runs and on both the medium and super soft compound tyres brought to the event by Bridgestone. “We saw two sessions where neither the long runs nor the single laps were looking particularly good,” he said. “We are not up to the speed we normally are on Fridays and our car does not look very good here.”

World Standings

Drivers

1 L Hamilton (Brit) McLaren 157 pts;

2 J Button (Brit) McLaren 143;

3 M Webber (Aus) Red Bull 136;

4 S Vettel (Ger) Red Bull 136;

5 F Alonso (Spn) Ferrari 123;

6 N Rosberg (Ger) Mercedes GP 94;

Constructors

1 McLaren-Mercedes 300 pts;

2 RedBull-Renault 272;

3 Ferrari 208;

4 Mercedes 132;

5 Renault 96;

6 Force India-Mercedes 47;