Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd
Invicta Racing’s Leonardo Fornaroli took pole position by 0.014 seconds in Formula 2’s Red Bull Ring qualifying session.
Fornaroli set the pace early on with a 1m15.769s lap, leading Prema’s Gabriele Mini and MP Motorsport’s Richard Verschoor.
ART Grand Prix’s Victor Martins later came 0.001 seconds shy of Fornaroli’s benchmark, while Rodin Motorsport’s points leader Alex Dunne appeared to be struggling down in 21st as he returned to the F2 cockpit after driving in Formula 1 practice.
Despite wide moments, Arvid Lindblad (Campos Racing), Max Esterson (Trident) and Sebastian Montoya (Prema) all managed to set personal bests, and Lindblad was provisionally in fifth place.
The second runs began with 10 minutes to go, and several drivers went for three preparation laps before going around at pace. That left less than five minutes to go for some as they attempted to improve.
Mini briefly occupied first place before Verschoor set a 1m15.253s. Rodin’s Amaury Cordeel then went third, posting a 1m15.417s and going over a second faster than Dunne.
Martins and Fornaroli were soon the fastest two drivers again, with the former setting a 1m15.243s to claim provisional pole while a mistake in sector one proved costly for the latter but he still improved to second.
Verschoor failed to improve on his final lap, complaining he had “no grip” as he struggled with oversteer and ran wide in the penultimate corner.
Dunne finally put in a competitive laptime, jumping to sixth with a 1m15.443s, and Fornaroli was getting faster too. He went quickest in two sectors and crossed the line in 1m15.229s.
Martins was yet to cross the line and had the chance to reclaim pole, but came 0.014s short. Verschoor was only 0.024s off pole in third, and Mini and Cordeel rounding out the top five.
Dunne was shuffled down to seventh by Invicta’s Roman Stanek, and completing the top 10 were Campos’s Pepe Marti and Van Amersfoort Racing’s John Bennett who will start on the front row for the reversed-grid sprint race.
Lindblad ended qualifying in 12th, but was less than a third of a second slower than Fornaroli, and fellow title contender Jak Crawford (DAMS) and Luke Browning (Hitech GP) fared even worse in 15th and 17th.
Qualifying results
| Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Leonardo Fornaroli | Invicta Racing | 1m15.229s | 16 | |
| 2 | Victor Martins | ART Grand Prix | 1m15.243s | +0.014s | 16 |
| 3 | Richard Verschoor | MP Motorsport | 1m15.253s | +0.024s | 16 |
| 4 | Gabriele Mini | Prema | 1m15.400s | +0.171s | 14 |
| 5 | Amaury Cordeel | Rodin Motorsport | 1m15.417s | +0.188s | 16 |
| 6 | Roman Stanek | Invicta Racing | 1m15.431s | +0.202s | 16 |
| 7 | Alex Dunne | Rodin Motorsport | 1m15.443s | +0.214s | 16 |
| 8 | Joshua Duerksen | AIX Racing | 1m15.480s | +0.251s | 16 |
| 9 | Pepe Marti | Campos Racing | 1m15.487s | +0.258s | 15 |
| 10 | John Bennett | Van Amersfoort Racing | 1m15.525s | +0.296s | 16 |
| 11 | Sebastian Montoya | Prema | 1m15.527s | +0.298s | 14 |
| 12 | Arvid Lindblad | Campos Racing | 1m15.546s | +0.317s | 15 |
| 13 | Ritomo Miyata | Rodin Motorsport | 1m15.574s | +0.345s | 16 |
| 14 | Sami Meguetounif | Trident | 1m15.651s | +0.422s | 15 |
| 15 | Jak Crawford | DAMS | 1m15.757s | +0.528s | 15 |
| 16 | Oliver Goethe | MP Motorsport | 1m15.781s | +0.552s | 17 |
| 17 | Luke Browning | Hitech GP | 1m15.801s | +0.572s | 15 |
| 18 | Kush Maini | DAMS | 1m15.878s | +0.649s | 15 |
| 19 | Max Esterson | Trident | 1m16.012s | +0.783s | 15 |
| 20 | Rafael Villagomez | Van Amersfoort Racing | 1m16.037s | +0.808s | 16 |
| 21 | Dino Beganovic | Hitech GP | 1m16.090s | +0.861s | 15 |
| 22 | Cian Shields | AIX Racing | 1m16.555s | +1.326s | 15 |