Mat Coch writes:

Both Ferrari and McLaren are hoping the weather turns in their favour this weekend as they look to close the gap to championship leaders Red Bull. After winning in cold conditions last weekend in Germany Lewis Hamilton is hoping for more of the same this weekend, while teammate Jenson Button is hoping for rain.

Having claimed his maiden Grand Prix victory at the Hungaroring in changeable weather in 2006, and with wet weather forecast for Friday, at least, Button was upbeat about his chances. "Rain would be a lot of fun around here," he enthused on Thursday. "We've been here in the wet before and for me it was one of the best races I've been involved in.

"It brings something to the race, but I think even in the dry, wet or intermediate conditions we've got to make sure we're quick."

However Ferrari doesn't share Button's enthusiasm for wet weather, the Italian team having struggled in cooler conditions so far this season. Much of the problem can be traced to the fact the Ferrari is more gentle on its tyres than its rivals, resulting in the drivers being unable to generate enough temperature. It's been a particular problem on the hard compound rubber, both Felipe Massa and Alonso struggling for pace.

"Hopefully Saturday and Sunday we see 40 degrees," he revealed. "It seems that the soft tyres - the soft and the supersoft - seem to work a little bit better for our car.

"Nurburgring was maybe the worst case because we had very low temperatures," he continued. "It was cloudy all weekend so the asphalt was very cold with no sunshine. The medium tyres were a little bit too hard for the Nurburgring, so in that case you needed two or three laps to have the confidence in the car to push. I think here and some other races, with the supersoft or soft tyre, the problem is much less."

Temperatures are forecast to hover in the low 20s throughout the weekend, with thunder storms for Friday practice. By the weekend however it's meant to clear, though the lower temperatures are expected to remain.

Those conditions should favour McLaren, which is able to generate heat easily. In fact Button and Hamilton find it difficult to keep their tyres cool enough, burning them up faster than their rivals in warmer weather, so cooler conditions should result in a more competitive McLaren outing.

"Our minimum seems to be close to the others maximum," Hamilton explained, "so we're always to warm up our tyres but we can never cool them enough.

"It's going to be 22 or 23 degrees throughout the weekend. If that's true then that's fantastic for us because for some reason I think we've always built our car to be in a certain window." Any warmer however and the 2008 World Champion believes the team will struggle with tyre wear, handing Red Bull the upper hand once more.

After two races in which they've been upstaged by championship rivals, Red Bull is once again the team to beat, with the weather handing McLaren an advantage over its Italian rival this weekend.