• Hungarian Grand Prix - Qualifying

Hamilton snatches pole from Vettel in Hungary

Chris Medland at the Hungaroring July 27, 2013
Lewis Hamilton took his fourth pole position of the season © Sutton Images
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Lewis Hamilton snatched pole position for the Hungarian Grand Prix with a brilliant final lap in qualifying.

With Sebastian Vettel having gone 0.8s clear of the field on the first runs in Q3, Hamilton delivered on his final lap to snatch pole position by less than 0.04s as Vettel failed to improve enough with his last effort. Hamilton was shocked to learn of the result afterwards on the team radio, replying with "Was that pole?!" and laughing as his race engineer told him "Yes, we're as surprised as you".

Romain Grosjean was third fastest as he continued his impressive weekend, with Nico Rosberg fourth but 0.3s slower than his team-mate. Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen make up the third row but will have a tough job taking points off Vettel at a track known for a lack of overtaking.

Daniel Ricciardo made it through in to Q3 for the fourth successive race and will start from eighth place, while Mark Webber endured a tough afternoon and failed to set a time in the final part of qualifying so will line up tenth.

Webber's qualifying session was hampered by a KERS failure during Q2 but he managed to ensure he made it through to the top ten with his final lap. However, that took an extra set of tyres while Vettel was able to remain in the pits after one run, with Mercedes securing the fastest times of the session on their second runs too.

An impressive final lap from Perez allowed him to squeeze through as Webber in eighth back to Nico Hulkenberg in 12th was covered by 0.077s. However, after showing encouraging pace early in qualifying it was the Williams pair of Pastor Maldonado and Valtteri Bottas who were slowest in the second part of the session.

It was another failure in Q1 for Esteban Gutierrez who dropped out while his team-mate Nico Hulkenberg was ninth in the same session, while Force India's tyre issues from Germany appear to have carried over to the Hungaroring as Paul di Resta also dropped out in 18th place. Charles Pic was a second off di Resta in the lead Caterham, with Giedo van der Garde ensuring it will be an all-Marussia back row.

Chris Medland is assistant editor at ESPNF1

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Chris Medland is assistant editor at ESPNF1 Chris Medland, who in his youth even found the Pacific GPs entertaining, talked his way in to work at the British Grand Prix and was somehow retained for three years. He also worked on the BBC's F1 output prior to becoming assistant editor ahead of the 2011 season

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