Hamilton storms to wet-weather pole in Hungary

Lewis Hamilton made the most of wet conditions to grab pole position for the Hungarian Grand Prix in qualifying at the Hungaroring on Saturday, heading up a one-two finish for Mercedes.

After trailing behind the Ferrari and Red Bull drivers in practice on Friday, Hamilton was able to surge to the top of the timesheets in a thrilling wet qualifying session in Hungary, with title rival Sebastian Vettel finishing down in fourth for Ferrari.

Rain in the lead-up to the start of qualifying saw drivers start the session on intermediates before switching to slicks midway through Q1, only for conditions to worsen for the second and third legs of the session, with drivers ending Q3 on full wet tyres.

Times were improving lap by lap in the closing stages of Q3 as a drying line emerged, but it was Hamilton who found the most time, finishing the session with a best lap time of 1m35.658s.

The lap saw Hamilton secure the 77th pole position of his F1 career, extending his all-time record in F1, with Bottas completing a front row lockout for Mercedes, two-tenths of a second behind in P2.

Kimi Raikkonen led Ferrari's charge, but failed to improve on his final lap despite holding provisional pole before the Mercedes drivers' final efforts, leaving him P3 at the chequered flag ahead of Vettel, who struggled to fourth.

Carlos Sainz Jr. starred for Renault by taking fifth place, beating both Red Bull drivers and leading the midfield fight. He will be joined on the third row of the grid on Sunday by Toro Rosso's Pierre Gasly, who matched the best qualifying result of his F1 career in sixth place.

Max Verstappen wound up seventh for Red Bull after struggling to improve his time in the conditions, finishing some 2.3 seconds adrift of pole-sitter Hamilton.

Brendon Hartley made it through to Q3 for the first time in F1 before qualifying eighth for Toro Rosso, just one-tenth behind Verstappen. Haas drivers Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean completed the top 10.

Fernando Alonso was one of the many casualties in Q2 after heavy rain hit the track early in the session, forcing everyone but Vettel to pit and switch from slicks to intermediate tyres. However, with track conditions worsening rapidly, Alonso paid the price for being far back in the queue, meaning he could only finish 11th. Alonso joked over the team radio he could have a "rocketship" and still not improve his time, so bad were the conditions.

The biggest shock exit in Q2 was Daniel Ricciardo, who finished 12th for Red Bull ahead of Renault's Nico Hulkenberg. Marcus Ericsson took P14 for Sauber, outqualifying teammate Charles Leclerc since Bahrain as the Monegasque driver finished down in P17.

Lance Stroll made it through to the second stage of qualfying, but spun into the wall in the wet, breaking his front wing and ending the session without a time to his name to finish 15th. Teammate Sergey Sirotkin ended Q1 as the slowest driver, propping up the timesheets in P20.

Stoffel Vandoorne suffered his fifth straight Q1 exit, meaning he finished 16th ahead of Leclerc, with the Force India duo of Esteban Ocon and Sergio Perez dropping out in 18th and 19th, both having fallen foul of the rapid improvements on slicks in the closing stages of Q1. Ocon was also hamstrung by a brake issue, leaving the struggling team plotting a fightback from the rear of the grid.