Alonso fastest in practice

Fernando Alonso bolstered his bid to return to the top of the drivers' standings by posting the fastest lap in practice for Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix.

Alonso was 14 points adrift of McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton heading into the French Grand Prix at the start of last month - but three races later, and the gap is now just two.

The Spaniard set a lap of one minute 20.919 seconds for the 4.384km Hungaroring circuit, ending the session 0.364secs ahead of Renault's Heikki Kovalainen, with team-mate Lewis Hamilton third.

With five minutes remaining, 22-year-old Hamilton lost the back end of his McLaren, spinning and ultimately stalling the car.

At least there was no damage done, unlike his 170mph qualifying smash in the European Grand Prix 13 days ago when he obliterated the front end after ploughing into a tyre barrier.

It meant a crane coming to Hamilton's aid to lift him out of the gravel, just as it did during the race at the Nurburgring when he was able to continue.

On this occasion, though, he was a mere bystander for the closing stages, albeit with no change to the top order.

Behind Hamilton came the Williams of Nico Rosberg and then Nick Heidfeld for BMW Sauber, with the Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa adding to the surprises by finishing sixth and seventh.

The second Renault of Giancarlo Fisichella was followed by the Toyotas of Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher sandwiching Robert Kubica, with the top 11 all within a second of one another.