Hamilton on pole at home

F1 Grand Prix, GP Great Britain, Silverstone Circuit

Lewis Hamilton has savoured the British hopes by driving to pole position for tomorrow's Grand Prix at Silverstone. Kimi Raikkonen, despite a slight error in the final corner is second, ahead of Alonso and Felipe Massa. Kubica is the first BMW in 5th place, followed by a stunning Ralf Schumacher in 6th.

Both Spykers kicked off this qualifying session without errors for once. Both drivers are close to each other with Albers just a slight bit faster. Next out is Kovalainen on the harder compound contrary to Spyker. The Finn is able to improve on the Spykers with almost 2 seconds. It immediately shows how far Spyker has been behind. They will have to do with their current chassis until the Mike Gascoyne-inspired update at the Turkish GP.

After the upper drivers passed through, Alonso is ahead of everyone with with a comfortable margin of 0.5 second to Hamilton and both Ferraris.

2 minutes before the end of the first session, Davidson ends up in the gravel trap and causes a yellow flag situation. Fortunately for the last minute runners the flag is quickly dropped. The most important victim of these attempts is Rosberg who had been competitive in the morning practice. Also knocked out are Button Davidson, Sutil, Sato and Albers.

Five minutes later we are into Q2 with Liuzzi being the first man on track. Coulthard is out second in his repainted Red Bull. The dark blue has been replaced by tiny images that have been bought by fans to support a charity. The layout certainly looks strange but will only hold for this Grand Prix.

Alonso again proved to be faster than anyone else in Q2, 1 tenth faster than Raikkonen. Hamilton and Massa complete the provisional top 4. Out are both Toro Rossos, the Red Bulls, Barrichello and Wurz.

That leaves us in Q3 with 5 complete teams, namely McLaren, Ferrari, BMW Sauber, Renault and Toyota. After the first string of quick laps Alonso is still on top of everyone. Massa is second, Raikkonen third and Hamilton fourth. The competition is however very tight as all 4 best are within 2 tenths. Hamilton might also have a slight benefit as he is a bit behind all others to put in a fastest lap.

The final times are a bit reversed and the advantage of Hamilton plays out as he put in the fastest time for pole position. Raikkonen will be aside of him, followed by Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa.