Hamilton grabs pole for home GP at Silverstone

F1 Grand Prix, GP Great Britain, Silverstone Circuit

Lewis Hamilton secured pole position for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, edging out his team mate Nico Rosberg in qualifying like he did earlier today in final practice.

The first part of qualifying kicked off with Roberto Merhi taking to the track, soon followed by many others, including both Mercedes drivers on the hard tyres. At Ferrari, Williams and Red Bull, strategies were similar, allowing their drivers to first set a lap on the hard and then see if that would eventually be enough to get through to Q2.

Most teams expected low down on the grid opted immediately for the mediums, although both McLarens first did a reconnasaince lap on the hards before pitting and changing to the mediums.

As Rosberg set the fastest time, times from the medium runners showed that many would have to get out for a second time, knowing their runs on the hards would be insufficient.

Raikkonen for instance popped up on track with the softer tyre to go fastest, albeit just 0.049s ahead of Rosberg. Vettel slotted into third, ahead of Hamilton, Bottas, Perez. Eventually only the Mercedes, Red Bulls and Williams' Valtteri Bottas managed to progress through to Q2 on the hard tyres.

Eliminated are Nasr in 16th, ahead of Alonso, Button, Stevens and Merhi.

Valtteri Bottas then started Q2 as soon as the pit lights went green. Moments later, both Massa and Hamilton were seen making some mistakes on their first flying laps. Massa went slightly off track to pick up some dirt while Lewis Hamilton's car oversteered badly through luffield with the Brit only just managing to catch it in time.

Verstappen on the other hand did not go off track, but complained of a lack of traction, saying "I can't do anything". The team pitted him to evaluate the situation, but unable to correct the issue, Verstappen got eliminated and will start in 13th place.

Perez was out as well in 11th, ahead of Grosjean, Verstappen, Maldonado and Ericsson.

In Q3, Bottas is again the first man out, followed closely by everyone. Interestingly, Nico Hulkenberg is the only one of the 10 runners at that time to go out on used mediums, contrary to new medium compound tyres for everybody else.

After the first trouble free laps, Hamilton came out fastest, a tenth quicker than Rosberg. Bottas and Massa follow at a second, ahead of Raikkonen, Vettel, Kvyat, Sainz, Ricciardo and finally Hulkenberg who was second down on Ricciardo's lap.

On the second attempt, Rosberg initially improved two tenths in the first sector, but further in the lap lost time and eventually was unable to get ahead of Hamilton. The only driver who really managed to make an improvement in the final minutes was Felipe Massa, resulting in a third place on the grid for him, ahead of his team mate Bottas.