Maini “hopeful and positive” for strong showing in Hungary F2 Feature Race

Credit: Formula 2

“ART are back,” remarked Kush Maini on the radio after qualifying in Hungary. 

It was a special moment to celebrate for the French manufacturer, marking their first F2 pole in Hungary since Nyck de Vries in 2019. In what marked one of the team’s best qualifying sessions, the other ART car of Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak will start fifth for the Sunday Feature Race. 

“It shows the work the team's been doing, and even Tas (Inthraphuvasak) is getting stronger and stronger,” Maini said, speaking on the team’s successful season so far.  

“So in that sense, a very positive sort of day and an interesting one.  

Yet, there was something certainly eye-catching about the way Maini took up his Friday running at the Hungaroring. While he didn’t set the timesheets alight, the ART man emerged as one of the quickest drivers through the twisty middle sector on the track. 

“I've always enjoyed it,” Maini responded, on the challenges of the Hungaroring. “Very technical and it gives you street circuit vibes. It’s like an old school track.”  

“Keeping your tyres in a good window for when it matters is important,” Maini addressed. And this would come to be one of the key aspects over the course of the 30-minute qualifying session on Friday evening.   

Drivers are often faced with the unique decision when they take to a session around the Hungaroring. The speedy first sector often prompts drivers to extract the best grip from their tyres, but then face a trickier compromise through the winding corners over the rest of the lap. 

Credit: Formula 2

The same would be visible in the laps of the top three at the end of the session, as they ran out of sync with the rest of the grid on their first laps. 

A tactical decision to wait until the first minutes of the session had flown by before going out to set their laps was vindicated for Maini, Rafael Câmara and Noel León. On a shorter, narrower venue like the Hungaroring, often named the “Monaco without walls”, the trio, along with a few others, waited for a clear track with fewer interruptions through the tight middle sector. 

“We obviously wanted to wait that first bit out and see, you know, hopefully the track gets cleared up a bit,” Maini said, speaking on his decision to go out later. 

“I think it helps getting your eye in and sort of what to expect.”

The decision would be vindicated for both Maini and teammate Inthraphuvasak, as they ascended into the top 10. Maini would slot in third quickest, behind the frighteningly quick Câmara and León. 

But even as the Invicta man went for a marginal improvement on his second flying lap, Maini made a crucial call to enter the pits for new tyres, emerging back on track with the rest of the grid for the second runs.  

The shorter turnaround meant Maini was still dialled in on the circuit, knowing he had a benchmark to beat, while he also was able to bring the tyres back up to speed more easily. 

“Keeping a bit of heat in the brakes and stuff, I think helped the warm-up for me in the second run,” Maini said, on this contrasting approach to the session. 

Even as Câmara and León waited in the garage to go out, the Indian driver had begun his flying lap. While he went quickest in the first sector, he made up more time in the second and third sectors. 

Carrying over his pace from Free Practice, Maini’s middle sector at 32.1 seconds amounted to the quickest of the session, while he still took the top spot despite a mistake in the final sector, as he grabbed slipstream from the car ahead on the start/finish straight. 

At 1:28.896, Maini was the first driver to head into the 1:28s. But by the end of the session, he would be the only one to do so. “Fortunately, I think our car held on better through the lap,” he remarked, delighted to have taken the top honours in the session. 

Despite Câmara and León’s best efforts to upstage his time, Maini still took pole by over a tenth of a second, putting himself in the best position for the Feature Race on Sunday. 

Before that, though, was the crucial sprint on Saturday, a valuable opportunity to make up ground and add to his points tally before the important Sunday race.    

“The first focus is to hopefully get points and move up the order,” he remarked, looking ahead to the Saturday race. 

The early stages of the sprint proved difficult to overtake around, with Maini expressing his frustrations over the radio early on, as he was stuck in the train of cars making up the lead pack. “This is a joke,” he remarked, unable to make headway from eighth, behind teammate Inthraphuvasak. 

Yet, as the race would play out, Maini would be presented with the opportunity to make the move on his teammate, before the clash between Nikola Tsolov and Sebastián Montoya elevated him to fifth, earning four valuable points to add to his tally for the season.  

But for the Indian driver, the sprint proved crucial in understanding the tyre wear on the medium compound, useful learning for the Feature Race on Sunday. 

However, there’s no doubt he stands on the cusp of a major moment in his F2 career. Despite running three F2 campaigns, Maini’s trio of wins have come on the Saturday sprint races, while he has only scored podiums twice in Feature Races in his career. 

Yet, there’s good reason to believe the Hungarian weekend could put an end to this long wait for the ART driver. Maini took his first win at the venue back in 2024 for Invicta Racing, and later backed it up with a seventh-position finish in the Feature Race. 

Despite being impeded by Montoya on his final flying lap and starting 20th in 2025, Maini eventually came home ninth in the sprint and 11th in the Feature Race, just shy of a points finish in either outing. 

The Hungaroring was also the scene of his only Formula 3 podium back in 2022, contributing to his only double points-scoring weekend back then. 

“Hungary has always clicked for me,” Maini reiterated when asked by DIVEBOMB about his success at the venue. “It's always been a track that's been nice to me. So coming here after a bad weekend, I was sort of hopeful and positive.” 

Pole has often been the better place to start around the Hungaroring, with two of the last three Feature Races won by front row starters. Even in 2024, pole-sitter Paul Aron finished second on the road, only thwarted by a late charge from Kimi Antonelli after a late safety car bunched up the field. 

While Maini may have been excited about going into the unknowns and new tracks later in the season, he heads into the biggest novelty on Sunday: Tackling a Feature Race from the front of the field and managing the pace all through. 

Even for a driver like Maini, who is the most experienced on the grid, he has to prepare himself for the unpredictability of an F2 Feature Race and tick off each box on the checklist if he is to bring home a big result. “In F2, you're going to have to have like a great day from all perspectives,” he responded, looking ahead to the Feature Race. “Anything can happen.”