Hamilton takes straightforward pole for Hungarian GP

F1 Grand Prix, GP Hungary, Hungaroring

Lewis Hamilton continued his dominant display at this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix weekend and took pole by half a second over his team mate. The Brit previously already topped all three practice sessions.

Even despite the fairly short track that the Hungaroring is, most drivers were out early for Q1, with Rosberg the very first. All top teams opted to do a number of laps initially on the medium tyre. That compound shows interesting performance on the third lap especially, after a driver completes a fast and a slower lap.

Hamilton's laps immediately proved a lot better than Rosberg's, with the latter soon reporting an issue with his car's balance, blaming understeer for his lack of performance.

Ricciardo similarly went strong, with McLaren initially settling into third and 6th, having run the soft tyres on their first outing. Vettel and Rosberg posted 4th and 5th times on the mediums.

Bottas then was the first to set a lap on the softs after having set a time on the medium tyres. As he ended up 2 seconds faster than his previous time, Button soon got informed he may very well have to go out again to ensure a place into Q2. It basically triggered everyone to change to softs, except for Ricciardo who opted to go out for another run on new mediums.

As times dropped, Hamilton kept ahead with his lap on the softs, ahead of Rosberg, Vettel, Kvyat and Raikkonen. Alonso narrowly managed to progress, along with Sainz, while Button qualified 16th, losing out due to a failed energy deployment on his flying lap. Behind him are Ericsson, Nasr, Merhi and Stevens.

5 minutes into Q2 session, Vettel and Raikkonen top the short timesheet of just 8 drivers. Alonso's engine probably thought that was enough for a while, kicking out and leaving Alonso without drive. Having been told by his race engineer that it would be ok to continue to run, the Spaniard coasted to the pitane, but ended up stopping on the uphill slope before the pitlane entry. He stepped out and started pushing, before eventually marshalls came in to help while the session became red flagged for 5 minutes.

Once back in the pits, Alonso handed his car to his engineers and took off his helmet, effectively ending the session without a timed lap.

Following McLaren's and Alonso's 5 minutes of fame, running got back underway as if nothing happened, with Hamilton again going fastest, ahead of Rosberg, Vettel and Ricciardo. Raikkonen and Kvyat also progressed, along with both Williams, Verstappen and Grosjean. Out are Hulkenberg, Sainz, Perez and Maldonado in 14th.

In the final session, Rosberg was the first to set a time, lapping the Hungaroring in 1:22.766. Hamilton soon proved quicker, just like his team mate completing his first flying lap on used softs. Vettel and Raikkonen slotted into third and fourth before Ricciardo managed to go faster than Raikkonen, all on new soft tyres and still more than half a second down on Hamilton.

On the next round of laps, Rosberg improved but failed to beat Hamilton, while the latter later on even improved on his initial best. Vettel and Ricciardo also stayed put in third and fourth, followed by Raikkonen and Bottas.