Young Hungarian engineer helping Mercedes Formula One team and already taking on major responsibilities

Hanna Horváth studied at both a Hungarian and a Dutch university and is currently an intern with the Mercedes Formula One team. She is roughly halfway through the programme, yet she has already been entrusted with important tasks and given the freedom to work independently. Her story offers inspiring proof for anyone fascinated by cars and engines – and willing to put in the hard work alongside mathematics – that it is possible to reach the very top of motorsport.

Széchenyi István University has dedicated a separate feature to Hanna’s journey, as she completed her BSc in vehicle engineering in Győr. She then moved on to a Master’s at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, where she is now specialising in aerodynamics. Since she had dreamed of working in Formula One from childhood, it was an easy decision to apply for an internship with the eight-time world champions, the Mercedes Formula One team.

Always drawn to aerodynamics

Hanna completed her bachelor’s degree in 2022 at the Audi Hungaria Faculty of Automotive Engineering. During her studies, she joined the Arrabona Racing Team (ART), which competes in the Formula Student series, contributing to the project for four years. She says this experience gave her a huge amount of hands-on, practical knowledge.

She explains that she always wanted to work in aerodynamics, but there are relatively few opportunities in this highly specialised field in Hungary. That is one reason she joined ART. She has also worked for Jaguar Land Rover and completed a space technology course. She is now enrolled in the aerodynamic specialisation of the aerospace engineering Master’s programme at Delft University of Technology, while spending her practical year with the Mercedes Formula One team. According to Hanna, aerodynamics is the largest engineering department in the organisation, and she is currently halfway through her assignment. For the time being, she is based in Brackley.

Independent, high-responsibility work at Mercedes Formula-1 team

“Our group mainly deals with different aspects of measurement technology: developing the wind tunnel and improving the related correlations. For example, I was given full responsibility for calibrating the Pitot tube on the nose of the car [a device used to measure flow velocity] – that task was entirely mine. Our work is incredibly interesting; for instance, we even use robots to support various measurement processes, boosting accuracy and reducing measurement errors. I enjoy the fast pace of the projects, the variety of the tasks, and the fact that we must solve many problems that also require coding skills,” she told the journalist of Széchenyi István University.

Hanna says the best part of her job is the immediate feedback: during tests and races, it becomes clear very quickly whether a particular development is working.

Sharing a workplace with global stars

The young Hungarian engineer describes the atmosphere at the team as almost family-like. Everyone uses the same canteen and gym as the big stars, so she has already bumped into Kimi Antonelli, George Russell and team principal Toto Wolff.

Hanna is not the only Széchenyi István University alumna to have found her place in the world of motorsport. Some graduates now work in rallying, while others – like Hanna – have carved out careers in Formula One.

If you missed our previous Formula One stories:

• After a decade of dreams, Hungaroring’s epic renovation finally completed — what this means for F1 fans
• Is the son of the former National Bank of Hungary governor running a private equity empire under a false name?
• Is it possible? Hungary’s best-known motorsport team sets its sights on Formula 1