Sebastian Vettel gave Mercedes a rare defeat at the British Grand Prix as he emerged the winner after an epic duel at Silverstone on Sunday.

The German took the lead at the start as pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton was slow away and the decision to pit during the first of two rapid-fire Safety Car periods proved the right one as he passed a struggling Valtteri Bottas in the closing laps to claim a decisive win in the championship.

Hamilton's poor start was compounded when, after Bottas also went past at Abbey, Kimi Raikkonen tried a move into Village but would lock his brakes a tapped the Mercedes around, dropping the home favourite to the back of the field.

A number of relatively simple overtakes allowed the world champion to recover to sixth by Lap 12 as Raikkonen would be given a 10-second penalty for the incident.

The Finn was also involved in his own battles with the Red Bulls, passing Daniel Ricciardo around the outside of Copse on the opening lap before finally dispatching Max Verstappen in the late flurry of action after the second Safety Car.

At the front, Vettel pulled out a comfortable five-second margin over Bottas in the lead but it was the Mercedes that looked to have the edge on tyre life as the Ferrari pitted first. Sensing an opportunity, Valtteri pushed harder after switching to the Mediums and closed the gap before the race direction turned.

Hamilton stayed out some six laps later than the leaders before making his own pit-stop for the Mediums and set about trying to close up on the Red Bulls, however, that was when a big crash for Marcu Ericsson at Abbey required the first Safety Car with both Mercedes' staying out while the Ferrari's and Red Bull's pitted again for Softs.

When the race resumed, Raikkonen was still behind Verstappen and made a bold move down the inside of the Dutchman on the Wellington Straight, only for Max to hit straight back around the outside at Luffield and hold on through Copse.

Just behind, Carlos Sainz and Romain Grosjean would make contact going through the same high-speed corner sending both into the barrier and necessitating the Safety Car for the second time.

A frantic final 11 laps were in store with Vettel still right behind Bottas, who had got ahead when Sebastian pitted, with Hamilton third.

At the restart, Raikkonen finally got past Verstappen on the approach to Stowe as Bottas thwarted a first attack by Vettel into Brooklands.

Ultimately, the Finn's tyres wouldn't last though, and a small slip in traction exiting the Loop allowed the Ferrari to dive down the inside at Brooklands again and this time re-inherit the lead he had held for much of the race.

A lap later, Hamilton made the same move on his teammate for second with Raikkonen knocking his fellow countryman off the podium two laps later.

Verstappen and Ricciardo would get close for P5, but a spin for Max approaching Vale allowed the Australian through before the 20-year-old later retired with a gearbox problem.

Though Ferrari power dominated the midfield in qualifying, an incident between the two Haas cars on the first lap dropped them down the order and Charles Leclerc would run well before having to retire with a loose wheel after his pit-stop.

That would allow Nico Hulkenberg to claim sixth for Renault ahead of Esteban Ocon in the Force India. Fernando Alonso made the most of the incidents around him to take P8 for McLaren as Kevin Magnussen recovered to ninth.

Pierre Gasly finished 10th on the road, but would be given a five-second penalty post-race for his robust move on Sergio Perez in the closing laps. That would drop the Frenchman down the 13th with the Mexican reclaiming the final point.

Stoffel Vandoorne would be 11th ahead of Lance Stroll with Sergey Sirotkin completing the finishers in 14th.

Following his suspension failure in practice on Saturday, it was a race against time to get Brendon Hartley's car ready for the race but ultimately the Kiwi would pull in after just two laps.

Back at the front, Vettel's victory gives the Ferrari driver an eight-point lead over Hamilton in the championship but after winning on the Briton's home turf at Silverstone, Lewis will now have the chance for payback in two weeks time as F1 returns to Hockenheim for the German Grand Prix.

Lewis Hamilton overcame the challenge from both Ferrari drivers to claim a dramatic pole position for the British Grand Prix in front of his home crowd.

In a thrilling battle for pole, mere hundredths of a second split the Mercedes driver and championship rival Sebastian Vettel in Q3 with the German claiming the initial advantage after the first runs.

On his second flying lap, however, the man from Stevenage found just enough to move ahead by 0.044s, a margin he would keep as Vettel failed to improve.

The action wasn't over though, as Kimi Raikkonen went fastest of all in the first sector but Hamilton's strength in the middle sector proved decisive as despite also setting the best final sector, the Finn fell 0.098s shy in third.

Valtteri Bottas pointed to a poor final sector as the reason for his three-tenths deficit in fourth, although a great lap from Max Verstappen would still see the Dutchman four-tenths slower in fifth.

Daniel Ricciardo lost DRS on the Wellington Straight during his first lap in Q3 yet still wouldn't improve on his second effort leaving the second Red Bull driver a further four-tenths back in sixth.

The majority of the lead midfield places went to Ferrari-powered cars as Haas secured the 'best of the rest' position for the second straight weekend with Kevin Magnussen in seventh and Romain Grosjean eighth.

Charles Leclerc made his second Q3 appearance in three races for Sauber in ninth as Esteban Ocon broke a run of 11th place starts and completed the top 10 in the Mercedes-powered Force India.

The Frenchman's effort in Q2 to make the final part of qualifying was his fastest lap of the session, just pipping Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez, who were both within a tenth, and dropping them to P11 and P12 respectively.

Fernando Alonso once again extracted the most from his McLaren in 13th, finishing eight-tenths ahead of teammate Stoffel Vandoorne in 17th as the Belgian described his car an "undrivable".

Pierre Gasly was a little nervy on his first laps in qualifying following the scary suspension failure for Brendon Hartley in the sister Toro Rosso in final practice.

The New Zealander wouldn't be able to take part in the session and the FIA requested all parts be changed on Gasly's car before he could go out, however, the Frenchman would do well in the circumstances in P14.

Marcus Ericsson made Q2 in the second Sauber but could do no better than 15th, still, it was enough to dump Carlos Sainz out of Q1 in 16th in the second Renault.

Williams endured a miserable session with Lance Stroll crashing out at Brooklands in the opening minutes, causing a red flag, and then Sergey Sirotkin would survive a spin at Stowe emerging from the gravel trap.

The Russian also survived an investigation by the stewards for failing to immediately pit when the red flag was shown but still, the British team will have their cars start 18th and 19th with Hartley bringing up the field.

Full results from qualifying can be seen below:

Brendon Hartley insists he still has "full faith" in his Toro Rosso team and is ready to go in the British Grand Prix following his scary suspension failure in final practice on Saturday.

The Kiwi was left nothing more than a passenger as his front-left simply exploded the moment he touched the brakes entering Brooklands, sending his car into the gravel and almost rolling metres before hitting the tyre barrier.

He was taken to the medical centre and soon released after being given the OK, and the FIA requested the junior Red Bull to change all suspension parts on Pierre Gasly's car as a precaution, as the former WEC champion explained what happened.

“It was very instantaneous,” he said. "There was no warning.

“I didn’t hit any kerbs and there were no vibrations beforehand, [it happened] the moment that I hit the brake pedal.

“Obviously I tried to fight the car, and slow it down as much as I could, but I still hit the wall pretty hard."

During the few seconds between the failure and the heavy impact with the tyre barrier, Hartley also revealed what was going through his mind.

"There’s very little time in the car to be scared. There’s too much focus and other things going on," he claimed.

"Maybe the last one or two seconds when I realised: ‘Yep, I’m definitely going to hit the wall pretty hard’, and you brace yourself.

"It’s not fun. I wouldn’t say it’s scary. You’re so focused on the race car and you have adrenaline. I wouldn’t say fear really comes into it."

Indeed, now his focus is on simply doing the best he can in the race, as he will start from the pit lane.

"I have full faith in everyone that they'll get the car ready for tomorrow and hopefully have a good race," he said.

"As a driver, I think you tend not to think about those things (the possibility of another failure), because if you do, you'll lose lap time out there,” he said. “I know everyone's not taking it lightly."

Lewis Hamilton put Mercedes back at the top of timesheets heading into qualifying but a scary crash for Brendon Hartley was the main story of final practice at the British GP.

The Kiwi would suffer a front-left suspension failure at the moment he touched the brakes on the approach to Brooklands, sliding straight into the tyre wall at high-speed and narrowly avoiding being flipping over in the gravel trap.

In an incident drawing many comparisons to Sebastien Buemi's memorable double failure in China practice in 2010, the suspension appeared to fold inwards but fortunately, the driver is OK.

Toro Rosso also elected not to run Pierre Gasly's again in the final hour of running as they look to discover the cause and prevent a repeat.

The accident caused a lengthy red flag but when the action did resume the final half an hour was given to low-fuel runs in preparation for qualifying.

Mercedes and Ferrari would swap positions almost every lap before Hamilton eventually finished in front with a 1m26.722s, just over a tenth off the pole time and lap record he set 12 months ago.

Kimi Raikkonen would be within a tenth in second for the Scuderia with Valtteri Bottas third.

Sebastian Vettel would not complete a full qualifying simulation in fourth, the reason being a neck strain for the German driver which he would be keen not to aggravate before qualifying and particularly the race around a high G-force track like Silverstone.

The two Red Bulls were 1.2s off the pace in fifth and sixth and for the second straight weekend may just have to watch over their shoulder as the lead midfield runners close up.

In final practice, it was Charles Leclerc in seventh for Sauber ahead of the two Haas drivers, Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean. The Monegasque's teammate Marcus Ericsson would complete the top 10 as Ferrari-powered cars dominated.

Both Force India's are ready to strike in 11th and 12th, as once again it is Esteban Ocon with the slight advantage over Sergio Perez.

Fernando Alonso was 13th for McLaren ahead of the Renault pair, with Nico Hulkenberg, despite overheating issues, just ahead of teammate Carlos Sainz.

The gaps in this midfield section were very close too, with a second covering Leclerc in seventh to Sainz in 15th.

Lance Stroll was seven-tenths behind the Spaniard in P16, however, marginally ahead of Williams partner Sergey Sirotkin with Stoffel Vandoorne bringing up the last of the representative lap-times with both Toro Rosso's stopping early.

Full results from the intriguing final practice session can be seen below:

Both Red Bull drivers are hoping the hot temperatures can bring them back into play in the race at the British Grand Prix after a difficult qualifying left them fifth and sixth.

With engine power proving very decisive to performance around Silverstone, with so many high-speed corners and elongated straights due to some turns now being flat out, Max Verstappen predicted it was over a second that he was losing to the Mercedes' and Ferrari's ahead.

Even a great lap in Q3 saw him eight-tenths off pole in P5 but the Dutchman is happy with the performance of the chassis.

"The car felt really good in qualifying, especially in Q3, we made some little adjustments to the front wing," he revealed.

"The car is strong, we all know that, and for tomorrow it's going to be a bit warmer but I still think it's going to be a bit of a struggle compared to the guys ahead."

Explaining why he added: "We have to push harder on our tyres and with the heat it's not ideal but let's see.

"Most of the time when we said it's going to be a boring race we actually got a very entertaining race, so I hope the same for tomorrow."

Also Read:

• Vettel sees tyre management as the key to killing Mercedes' Silverstone 'magic'

Teammate Daniel Ricciardo was four-tenths down on Verstappen, mostly due to losing DRS on the Wellington Straight, still, his lap was enough to beat the Haas cars into P6 and the Australian claims the plan has been worked out for a multi-stop race.

"I'm really optimistic that's it not going to be a one-stop boring race, I think it's going to be hotter tomorrow from what I understand. Hopefully a two stop works," he said.

"We chose to save a new set of softs in Q2 if we need to use them in the race.

"We're planning a little bit in advance for tomorrow, we kind of knew in qualifying we were going to be fifth and sixth as a team, so we'll try to make the most of the race."

Lewis Hamilton has slammed the FIA's decision to add a third DRS zone at Silverstone which is leaving open the possibility to take Turns 1 and 2 flat-out with the rear wing open.

Friday saw the drivers begin to assess the possibility of entering Abbey with DRS active and though some early attempts from Max Verstappen were successful, it was a crash for Romain Grosjean which was most notable.

The preferred method by the end was to manually close the wing on the approach before re-opening on the exit but, as Grosjean explained, even that presents a challenge.

“The car was fast this morning and I closed the DRS a bit too late on that lap,” he admitted. “The airflow didn’t recover and I lost the rear end."

For Hamilton though, seeing the Haas go off was vindication for a stance he took with Formula 1's governing body in the drivers briefing.

"I was like, ‘Ron, you should tell [race director] Charlie Whiting, someone’s going to crash' because the speeds we go into Turn 1 are insane," he said.

“And what happened today? I was like, ‘told you’."

Sebastian Vettel also revealed reservations about the Abbey DRS and for the Mercedes driver, the whole concept has little merit.

“It’s just kind of not necessary really to have it through there," he claimed. "I mean, we’re all managing, but if someone sticks [with DRS at Turn 1] in qualifying, they’re going to crash – so that’s kind of why it’s an unnecessary danger.

“We used to have DRS everywhere [in practice and qualifying] and we had to engage [it] and take off, and they stopped us from doing that because people were spinning off.” 

Lewis Hamilton claimed the final lap he produced to claim pole for the British Grand Prix was the "toughest" he's had to do in the face of Ferrari pressure.

The world champion was second behind Sebastian Vettel after the first run of the all-important Q3 segment by around half a tenth, however, he would turn it around on his second attempt to claim pole by that margin, indeed car no.44 was ahead by just 0.044s.

Addressing a capacity crowd at his home race, the majority of which went crazy as he crossed the line, the Mercedes driver revealed just how hard he had to push to achieve his lap time.

"That lap took everything out of me, it was the toughest lap I've ever had to do in a qualifying session," he told Sky Sports' Martin Brundle.

"I gave it everything I could. It was so close between these Ferrari's [who] pulled something out when it got to Q3.

"I had to go over the limit to get that time out of the car and I could have easily not pulled that lap together, so I'm thankful that I was able to do it."

Such was the intensity, Hamilton claimed he couldn't remember the final lap but put those extra few hundredths down to the incredible fans at Silverstone.

"I was just praying I could do it for you guys," he said. "I'm so grateful for the support because without you guys I wouldn't have been able to do it.

"I knew that the fans were right there with me; every time I go out I see them cheering. The support I get at this track is phenomenal; it means the world to me and it really lifts me up."

For the world champion though, it is only a job half done with the race to come on Sunday and the threat from Ferrari not likely to back down.

"The start and the tyre management will be key for the race; I'm going to see my guys tonight and tell them to keep pushing so that we're as good as we can get tomorrow."

Sebastian Vettel believes an emphasis on tyre management could be crucial to ending what he called Mercedes' "magic" at the British GP this weekend.

In the first session at Silverstone, it appeared like the dominance of recent years would continue as Lewis Hamilton led Valtteri Bottas in a comfortable 1-2. As the heatwave temperatures reached their peak in the afternoon though it was the German and Ferrari who moved to the front.

With the hot conditions expected to continue across the weekend, the near two-tenth advantage Vettel had over Hamilton does mean the Briton's unbeaten run at home since 2014 is under threat. Although the 31-year-old did admit it was important to put down a marker.

“It’s been a good Friday," he said. “We try to kill their magic. Obviously, that’s what we have tried over the last years and I think here and there we have succeeded quite well.

“It’s true that they are very strong around here and we expect them to be very strong tomorrow. But I hope we can be there and I hope we can be close as historically, [Silverstone] has not been a very strong track for us."

Along with Mercedes' known strength in high-speed corners, many believed the use of the thinner-treaded Pirelli tyres that Hamilton won so easily with at Barcelona and Paul Ricard would offer the same advantage again.

Such are the conditions though, Vettel suggests that may not be the case at Silverstone.

"The tyres are hot, too hot!" he claimed, "But I think it's the same for all of us. Obviously the magic this weekend will be to try and keep them as cool as possible."

Also helping is the latest upgrades Ferrari have brought, including a new floor.

"Everything we put on the car seemed to work," Vettel stated. "It's a small step in the right direction, but more important was that the balance was there right away and I felt a good rhythm from the start of the day.

"This track may not see us as favourites, but with regard to last year I think our car has more potential," he added. "It’s up to us to find the way to get the most out of it."

Sebastian Vettel may have looked his normal self on the track but a neck problem left him unsure of his participation in qualifying for the British Grand Prix on Saturday.

The Ferrari driver would cut short his running in final practice but after some treatment would be involved in an epic fight with Lewis Hamilton for pole around one of the most demanding circuits of the year on the neck at Silverstone.

Ultimately, the local favourite would pip the German to pole by just 0.044s, but just to be out on track was a relief in itself for the 31-year-old.

“To be honest this morning no, I wasn’t sure if I could do qualifying,” Vettel admitted.

“It was not the most enjoyable session, but it’s fine. I don’t know what happened, but it was a bit stiff. We loosened it up."

Faced with having to do 52 laps on Sunday, the four-time world champion also believes it will be less of an issue regardless of any improvement overnight.

"I’m not worried [for the race] because the speed will be less than qualifying," he stated.

As for missing out on pole by such a small margin, Vettel believes he might know where the difference was although it was very tough to tell.

“I was pretty happy with the first run in Q3, I knew I had to give a bit more in sector three, which I think I got right on the second attempt, but I seemed to lose a little bit down the straights,” he analysed.

“I’m not sure why. I set two laps that were identical, half a tenth you can always argue you can find time somewhere, I think he was just a little better on the final runs."

As for the relative performance in the race, with the hot conditions set to continue, Sebastian does think the Italian team can have the edge.

“I’m confident we can be faster tomorrow, you’ve seen today were able to pick up pace and the race is usually a bit better for us,” he claimed.

“We’ll see what happens tomorrow on Lap 1 but obviously, the race will depend on your speed and how you conserve these tyres but I think we had a good run in practice and have a good idea of what we need to do.”

Lewis Hamilton was gushing in his praise of Silverstone after practice ahead of Sunday's British GP but is expecting a demanding weekend at his home track.

It was business as usual for the world champion in the morning, as he led the first session, but in the heat of the afternoon, it was Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel that took the lead, albeit falling shy of the benchmark the Mercedes driver set.

Still that wasn't the first thought on Hamilton's mind as he goes in search of a fifth straight win in Britain, instead it was simply the experience of driving around Silverstone's iconic curves.

"It’s got to be the best track in the world," he declared. "It’s ridiculous. It’s like driving a fighter jet around the track.

"Oh my god, it’s the fastest it’s ever been. We’re flat-out through Copse, through Turn 1 [Abbey], through Turn 2 [Farm] with the DRS. It’s insane. It’s insane how fast it is… The faster it gets, the better it gets."

But that combination of multiple high-speed corners and the unusually high temperatures even for July is likely taking its toll on those behind the wheel.

"It’s going to be the most physical race of the year for me, I think," Hamilton said.

"It’s one of the best tracks because it’s so physical. The speeds we’re going now, the g-forces we’re pulling through Copse, through Maggots and Becketts – you’re flat-out, going all the way into Maggots."

The hot conditions are why Ferrari is predicted to be in with a decent chance of victory as Mercedes' age-old weakness is exposed.

"[We had] some [tyre] overheating issues," Valtteri Bottas admitted.

"The track temps were more than 50 degrees today and it’s going to be the same thing tomorrow afternoon and also Sunday afternoon, so we just need to deal with that."

Hamilton though was most impressed with how Pirelli copes with the challenge of Silverstone.

"The loads that you’re putting through the tyre – this is when it really impresses me what the manufacturers are able to do with these tyres, because geez," Lewis said somewhat in awe.

"Tens of thousands of Newton metres… I don’t know how much that is in weight, but it’s tons of weight going through these tyres and through your body."