Brazilian F1 Grand Prix 2016 Qualifying: Saturday's Results, Times, Final Grid

Lewis Hamilton will start on pole at the 2016 Brazilian Formula One Grand Prix on Sunday after topping Saturday's qualifying session with a time of one minute, 10.736 seconds.

Title rival Nico Rosberg will start in second, while Kimi Raikkonen took third place in Q3.

Rosberg had been the fastest in the third and final free practice session on Saturday ahead of Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton and Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace in Sao Paulo.

Qualifying Recap

Here is how the drivers will line up on the grid on Sunday, per F1's official Twitter feed:

Former world champion Nigel Mansell remarked on the difficult conditions the teams faced:

As they had in FP3, Jenson Button, Marcus Ericsson, Esteban Ocon, Felipe Nasr and Pascal Wehrlein struggled in Q1 and were eliminated along with Kevin Magnussen, who slipped from 13th in practice to 18th.

Button expressed his frustration after a promising practice day on Friday:

In Q2, Hamilton laid down the gauntlet for the rest of the field, per Pirelli Motorsport:

Local favourite Felipe Massa almost qualified for Q3 with his final lap, only to see Nico Hulkenberg, Sergio Perez and Romain Grosjean improve at the death.

Valtteri Bottas, Esteban Gutierrez, Daniil Kvyat, Carlos Sainz and Jolyon Palmer also failed to make the grade.

Hamilton continued his strong run in Q3 to finish ahead of Rosberg, ensuring his 11th pole position of the season.

Raikkonen took third place from Max Verstappen with his final effort, consigning the 19-year-old to fourth on the grid.

A win for Hamilton will bring the race for the title down to the final Grand Prix in Abu Dhabi—he's done his chances no harm by securing pole.

FP3 Recap

Here are the standings from FP3, per F1:

Immediately before the start of the session, the heavens opened over the track:

Several drivers, including Raikkonen and Vettel, headed out on full wets, but with no water standing on the track, others preferred slick or intermediate tyres.

Raikkonen quickly set the pace for the rest of the field with an early time of 1:12.530 and was also quickest in all three sectors:

At the halfway point, Hamilton and Rosberg found themselves in the unusual position of recording the slowest times in the field, as noted by Pirelli:

Daniel Ricciardo and Verstappen would eventually top Raikkonen, but after swapping to a new set of softs, Rosberg was able to clock the fastest time of the weekend thus far.

Hamilton soon followed but found himself just behind his Mercedes team-mate:

Behind them, late flourishes from Vettel and Raikkonen were enough to secure them third and fourth place, respectively.