Lewis Hamilton on Pole - Hungary GP 2012

Lewis Hamilton produced a qualifying masterclass in Hungary, with the Lotus' hot on his heels. The McLaren driver put in hot lap after hot lap beating his own times on his way to Pole position closest to him was Romain Grosjean of Lotus 4 tenths off but showing for once the true pedigree in those cars. Sebastian Vettel popped himself into 3rd but bailed on his final lap after running through one of the gravel traps. Jenson Button was still unhappy with the handling of his McLaren but managed to get to 4th on the grid while fighting understeer. Raikkonen disappointed slightly in his Lotus but will still be able to fight for the podium from his starting position of 5th. The Ferrari's of Alonso and Massa will line up together starting in 6th and 7th respectively, a damage limitation it seemed after not looking quick this weekend. The same with the Williams drivers Maldonado 8th and Senna surprising a few in 9th, Senna needed this after a lot of talk of Bottas being lined up to take his spot. Nico Hulkenberg won't be happy after managing to get himself into Q3 but finishing 10th and starting directly ahead of his team-mate who went out in Q2. In Q1 Red Bull were hard pushed to get through once everyone had strapped on a set of Soft tyres and the track evolved, catching a lot of teams out. Vettel and Webber finished up 16th and 17th, but used a set of highly valued soft tyres. The Caterhams performed well until Vergne put the softs on in his Toro Rosso and blitzed the field to go 3rd, prompting a lot of teams to call in their boys for the softs. At that point the lower teams knew they would be hard pushed and as usual the last 6 were the HRT's, Marussia's and Caterhams in formation with Daniel Ricciardo being the straggler from the mid-teams to join them. Q2 had a few surprises in store, Mark Webber and his Red Bull making an early exit to start 11th even though he seemingly passed the line with a second to go but didn't carry on to set another lap. It was Bruno Senna who bumped him out after putting on a good show in the Practice sessions this weekend even though Valteri Bottas ran his car in 1st Practice. Schumacher's Mercedes looked tired and finished last (17th), but was on a quick lap until he ran into Maldonado's dust cloud after he'd ran slightly off track and had to slow which wrecked his lap. Also out in Q2 was the Sauber pair, once again showing that their cars are brilliant in the race (see last weekend in Germany) yet look painfully slow in Qualifying. Behind them was Vergne's Toro Rosso, who made a rare show in Q2 as he usually joins the back of the field in Q1. Rosberg succumbed to the same problems as Schumacher, struggling to get his car to work on the low downforce track. Di Resta follows on from his 'could do better' assessment of his Force India team and finished in 12th when they expected to push for Q1. So after looking blisteringly quick all weekend Lewis rounded off a perfect start and he will be hoping he can wrap up for the mid-season break with a win in Hungary.