Lewis Hamilton captured pole position for Mercedes for the season-opening Australian Grand Prix in a thrilling finish to a rain-hit qualifying session yesterday, while champion Sebastian Vettel failed to make the top 10.

Hamilton saved the best for last with his final lap of a gloomy session after Australian Daniel Ric-ciardo had stormed to the top of the timesheets only seconds earlier on his first race weekend for champions Red Bull.

The 29-year-old Briton’s time of one minute 44.231 seconds on a greasy Albert Park track was just over three-tenths of a second faster than Ricciardo, who upstaged team-mate Vettel to the delight of the home fans.

Vettel, winner of the last nine races of 2013, was only 13th fastest and was frustrated by a crash late in the final session by Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen which brought out the yellow flags and forced drivers to ease their pace.

“Today made it so much harder with the conditions, but I’m really happy with the job the team did,” said Hamilton, whose 32nd pole equalled Nigel Mansell’s British record.

Mercedes’s Nico Rosberg will start third on the grid alongside McLaren’s 21-year-old Danish rookie Kevin Magnussen, who underlined his talent with a poised drive in trying conditions.

Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso qualified fifth with Jean-Eric Vergne sixth fastest for Toro Rosso.

It was the first time Vettel had failed to make the final round of qualifying since he started 11th on the grid in Belgium in 2012, before battling through the field to finish the race second.

Vettel will move up to 12th, however, with Williams’ Finnish driver Valtteri Bottas dropped from 10th place after taking a five-place penalty for a gearbox change.

Ricciardo, who has shouldered Australia’s hopes since the retirement of his Red Bull predecessor Mark Webber at the end of last season, had few illusions about the gap between the teams.

“I think if it was a dry qualifying we were expecting Lewis and Nico to be on the front row,” the 24-year-old said.

“Hopefully, the upward trend continues and we can start to hassle these guys in dry conditions soon.”

With teams already struggling to master the new turbocharged hybrid engines, fuel consumption will add an additional layer of complexity for drivers in today’s race, with a new rule limiting cars to 100 kilogrammes of petrol.

Vettel will be in esteemed company in the grid, with two other champions, McLaren’s Jenson Button and Raikkonen, also failing to get into the final group of 10.

Button qualified 11th but will start 10th, while Raikkonen, the 2007 world champion, was 12th fastest on his first Saturday since returning to Maranello.

The Finn, winner in Melbourne with Lotus last year, crashed into the wall at turn 14.

Brazilian Felipe Massa will start ninth on the grid in his first race since crossing to Williams from Ferrari.

Japan’s Kamui Kobayashi, making his comeback after being dropped by Sauber at the end of 2012, gave lowly Caterham a boost by qualifying 15th – which will become 14th after Bottas drops down.

Lotus’s horror week continued as both Frenchman Romain Grosjean and Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado were among the six knocked out of the first session.

Grosjean locked up and spun off after posting the slowest lap time in the opening session, while Maldonado was unable even to trouble the timesheets due to a problem with the power unit and will rely on the stewards’ discretion for a Sunday start.

Sauber’s Mexican driver Esteban Gutierrez, who qualified 19th yesterday, also collected a five-place grid penalty for today’s Grand Prix for having a new gearbox installed.

Today’s grid at Albert Park

Note: Bottas and Gutierrez lose five positions after gearbox change.