McLaren victory first KERS win

KERS cars finished 1 2 at the Hungaroring Sunday with McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton winning comfortably from second places Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen. This is the first win for a KERS equipped car in F1. Although four teams started the season with KERS, currently only McLaren and Ferrari run KERS in F1.

The Hungaroring has one of the lowest average speeds of any Grand Prix track consisting of more slower corners and few high speed corners. The season dominating Brawn and Red Bull cars are known to be aero cars where the faster the track the more of an advantage they have over the field. On a low speed track such as Hungry this advanatge is reduced, so much so that Rubens Barrichello qualified outside the top 10 and finished outside the points while Button finished only seventh.

With an extra 80 hp of EV power off the start line, both the McLaren's and Ferrari's poses a serious treat at the start of any Grand Prix. Originally conceved as a push-to-pass button, drivers from rival teams are increasingly compalining that it is being used to prevent passing. Sebastian vettel has made mention of the Red Bull teams lack of a KERS system in many press conferences, particularly with reference to being unable to pass Ferrari drivers in the race.

The in-house developed battery powered KERS system in the McLaren features custom lithium-ion power cells developed by A123Systems that apparentkly offer more than 20,000 W/kg, according to Ric Fulop, one of A123Systems’s co-founders.