• ‘It’s been a long time’ says delighted McLaren driver
• Fernando Alonso handed suspension for European grand prix

Lewis Hamilton had almost forgotten the routine for the first three finishers. Today the world champion, for two seasons so familiar with it, had to remind himself of the procedure after winning the Hungarian grand prix and finishing on the podium for the first time in 2009.

“Great to see you. It’s been a long time,” he said as he walked beaming into the conference room along with Kimi Raikkonen and Mark Webber. Hamilton’s obvious pleasure came from reacquainting himself with spraying victory champagne and appreciating the McLaren team’s efforts in returning him to the podium. “This has been a huge leap for us,” he said. “We definitely deserve this after such a long time and after a season that has been very hard on everyone in the team.”

Once the McLaren engineers had finally established the fundamental faults with a car that Hamilton had, at times, found impossible to drive, the Woking team worked flat out to produce and test new parts, the latest changes to the front wing arriving on Friday. Hamilton rewarded the effort by qualifying fourth but confessed yesterday that he did not expect to win.

“It could have gone either way,” he said. “But everything just sort of fell into place. I had quite a good start. It was very close and I immediately got into a fight with Mark [Webber]. He was very fair and I was able to use Kers to good advantage.”

McLaren and Ferrari are the only two teams persisting with Kers energy retention, a system which was not expected to deliver a significant performance advantage on the twists and turns of the Hungaroring. But Hamilton and Raikkonen, who finished second for Ferrari, used the 6.5sec power boost on the main straight as a means of keeping the opposition at bay.

Hamilton’s cause was helped by Renault’s plans for a first win this season coming apart within 12 laps. Fernando Alonso had claimed pole position by running with a light load of fuel during qualifying and planning to stop three times for fuel as opposed to the two-stop strategy favoured by everyone else. Alonso took the lead as planned but was soon slowed by fuel pump problems. The denouement for the former world champion was more embarrassing when he lost a front wheel shortly after his first pit stop, letting Hamilton into a lead he would not lose.

Renault, world champions in 2006 and 2007, were suspended from the next race in Valencia, a home grand prix for Alonso. The team have appealed. The stewards decided that Alonso was released from his pit in the knowledge that the wheel securing nut was not in position “which resulted in a heavy part of the car detaching at Turn 5 and the wheel itself detaching at Turn 9″. It is perhaps no coincidence that the decision comes a week after Henry Surtees was killed by an errant wheel at Brands Hatch.

“Maybe we would not have won but we definitely missed an opportunity to finish on the podium,” said Alonso, before hearing the stewards’ decision. “The car was quick but there was a problem fitting the right-front wheel at the first pit stop. When I left the pits there was a lot of vibration and it felt like I had a puncture. But then a few corners later the wheel flew off my car. I made it back to the pits for a replacement but a problem I’d had with my fuel pump since lap two returned and I had to retire.”

It might have been Raikkonen assuming the lead had the Finn managed to overtake Hamilton during an eventful first lap as the Ferrari driver elbowed his way past Nico Rosberg’s Williams, the McLaren of Heikki Kovalainen and Sebastian Vettel’s Red Bull.

“I had a collision on the first corner with Kimi,” said Vettel. “I was on the inside and had a clear run to accelerate, his car came sideways and we touched. He crashed into my car; it can happen. At some point the front-left suspension gave up and we had to retire the car. There are still a few races left this season and the championship fight is still on.”

Vettel dropped to third place on the points standings after Webber finished on the podium for the fourth race in succession. “I think Lewis thoroughly deserved to win today,” said Webber. “It was a good day for the sport to have McLaren and Ferrari back up there.”

Jenson Button, although disappointed with the performance of his Brawn, ought to agree because Hamilton and Raikkonen claimed points that otherwise would have gone to Webber, now Button’s closest championship rival. Button’s team never fully recovered from the setback during qualifying when a rear spring fell off Rubens Barrichello’s car and caused the serious accident involving Felipe Massa. Button’s qualifying was compromised as safety checks were made to his car but the championship leader was not happy from the outset of the race, complaining that he could barely drive the car.

Hamilton had made similar comments about his McLaren during previous races and Button can only hope that his team can recover lost ground during the summer break before the European grand prix on 23 August.