Hill On Top

Damon Hill, hoping to retain his ride next season with the Williams-Renault Formula One team, took the provisional pole for the running Sunday of the Hungarian Grand Prix.

But Hill wasn’t thinking about 1996 after turning a lap of 113.272 mph at the Hungaroring.

Hill, 34, who spun out two weeks ago barely one lap into the German Grand Prix, had a lap of one minute, 18.374 seconds on the 2.466-mile track.

Teammate David Coulthard was second-fastest, .626 seconds slower than Hill.

Defending Formula One champion and current points leader Michael Schumacher of Germany, who got married last week and is said to be close to signing with Ferrari for next year, managed only fourth-best in provisional times trials.