Max at The Great Run: 'As always in Hungary, the crowd was really passionate'

Published on 01 May 2018 by Niels Hendrix

The Aston Martin Red Bull Racing Live Demo team are always keen to try new things – but they have their established favourites also, one of which is The Great Run, Budapest’s annual May Day festival of speed and power.

This year Max Verstappen was in the hot seat, piloting the RB8 through the [closed] street of downtown Pest on two runs, putting the Double Championship-winning V8 through its full repertoire of donuts, burnouts and speed runs in front of a 200,000 strong crowd.

“It was a nice day, and I really enjoyed it,” said Max. “The crowd was huge and, as always in Hungary, really passionate. I love driving the RB8, as well. It sounds wonderful – and it’s an excellent car for donuts!”

This year’s track ran from Károly Körút, via Kossuth Lajos Utca to Ferenciak Tere, through the centre of the city, with Max joined by stars of DTM, Autocross and Rallycross. The event, as is traditional, also featured an aerial display from the Flying Bulls and Red Bull Air Race world champion (and all-round Hungarian legend) Peter Besenyei. Max also did a lap in an Aston Martin Vanquish S waving to the crowd, signed a lot of autographs and completed a media session.

“Happily, the weather was good today and that always helps,” added Max. “I think we put on a great show, both the guys on the ground and the planes and helicopters from the Flying Bulls. It’s really great to be in Budapest today.”

Max also found time to take to the PlaySeat and complete some laps of the Hungaroring against a local gamer. He’ll now put in some seat time with a rather more serious simulator in preparation for next week’s Spanish Grand Prix at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.