Home Formula RegionalFRegional European Championship Aron tops FREC FP1 at Monza as Buhler and Donegan join grid

Aron tops FREC FP1 at Monza as Buhler and Donegan join grid

by Ida Wood

Photo: FRECA

The 2022 Formula Regional European Championship began at a wet Monza with free practice on Friday morning, and two late signings.

There were 36 drivers out on track during the opening practice session of the season, with R-ace GP adding a fourth car for Lena Buhler (who competed for the team last year and more recently in FRegional Asian Championship) and the new Race Performance Motorsport team running the second of its cars for its team boss and former Formula Ford star Keith Donegan.

FP1 was delayed due to the wet weather in Italy, and when it began it was debuting team Trident that went to the top with Leonardo Fornaroli.

He was almost a second faster than anyone else before yellow flags came out and prevented anyone from improving, but once the track returned to green it was MP Motorsport’s Michael Belov who then went fastest.

His 1m48.987s was also a jump of almost a second over the rest of the field, but Fornaroli’s team-mate Tim Tramnitz was soon able to get within 0.015 seconds of him.

Arden’s Eduardo Barrichello was the next driver to top the timesheet, with he and Fornaroli going faster than Belov, and it was the son of Formula 1 race-winner Rubens Barrichello who sat in first place going into the second half of the hour-long session.

ART Grand Prix’s Gabriele Mini got close to Barrichello’s laptime, then went to the top himself by breaking into the 1m47s. That made him the man to beat until the final five minutes, when Prema came to the fore.

It had kept its drivers in the pits early on, but once Paul Aron and Dino Beganovic were on track they were rapid and quickly put themselves in the top two positions.

Beganovic was initially ahead, but Aron bettered him with a minute to go to end FP1 as fastest by 0.084s. Belov got back up to third, and R-P-M’s Pietro Delli Guanti was a surprise fourth with a late lap.

Free practice results
Pos Driver Team Time Gap Laps
1 Paul Aron Prema 1m46.726s 19
2 Dino Beganovic Prema 1m46.810s +0.084s 20
3 Michael Belov MP Motorsport 1m47.194s +0.468s 20
4 Pietro Delli Guanti R-P-M 1m47.234s +0.508s 19
5 Sebastian Montoya Prema 1m47.375s +0.649s 20
6 Joshua Dufek Van Amersfoort Racing 1m47.532s +0.806s 19
7 Eduardo Barrichello Arden 1m47.557s +0.831s 20
8 Noel Leon Arden 1m47.565s +0.839s 20
9 Kas Haverkort Van Amersfoort Racing 1m47.649s +0.923s 20
10 Joshua Duerksen Arden 1m47.656s +0.930s 20
11 Tim Tramnitz Trident 1m47.706s +0.980s 20
12 Leonardo Fornaroli Trident 1m47.717s +0.991s 20
13 Nicolas Baptiste FA Racing by MP 1m47.818s +1.092s 19
14 Santiago Ramos KIC Motorsport 1m47.826s +1.100s 19
15 Gabriele Mini ART Grand Prix 1m47.925s +1.199s 14
16 Hadrien David R-ace GP 1m47.964s +1.238s 20
17 Victor Bernier FA Racing by MP 1m48.084s +1.358s 20
18 Piotr Wisnicki KIC Motorsport 1m48.169s +1.443s 19
19 Roman Bilinski Trident 1m48.169s +1.443s 18
20 Matias Zagazeta G4 Racing 1m48.172s +1.446s 20
21 Dilano van’t Hoff MP Motorsport 1m48.198s +1.472s 20
22 Esteban Masson FA Racing by MP 1m48.242s +1.516s 20
23 Francesco Braschi KIC Motorsport 1m48.267s +1.541s 15
24 Mari Boya ART Grand Prix 1m48.398s +1.672s 20
25 Laurens van Hoepen ART Grand Prix 1m48.408s +1.682s 21
26 Owen Tangavelou G4 Racing 1m48.464s +1.738s 20
27 Levente Revesz Van Amersfoort Racing 1m48.519s +1.793s 20
28 Keith Donegan R-P-M 1m48.545s +1.819s 20
29 Maceo Capietto Monolite Racing 1m48.720s +1.994s 15
30 Gabriel Bortoleto R-ace GP 1m48.816s +2.090s 20
31 Pietro Armanni Monolite Racing 1m48.820s +2.094s 17
32 Lorenzo Fluxa R-ace GP 1m48.960s +2.234s 20
33 Axel Gnos G4 Racing 1m49.026s +2.300s 20
34 Sami Meguetounif MP Motorsport 1m49.289s +2.563s 10
35 Lena Buhler R-ace GP 1m49.554s +2.828s 19
36 Cenyu Han Monolite Racing 1m49.600s +2.874s 19