Photo: Evan Giltaire / Jason Vian
Evan Giltaire took pole position by more than a quarter of a second on his car racing debut at the first round of the French Formula 4 season at Nogaro.
The fastest times were set in the first 10 minutes of the 25-minute session, with top two qualifiers Giltaire and Kevin Foster heading into the pits soon afterwards.
Friday pacesetter Foster led the way early on, working his way down to a 1m28.152s on his second flying attempt.
Giltaire made a slower start but then became the first and only driver to get below 1m28s, setting a 1m27.870s with only seven minutes on the clock.
His next lap would be 0.293s slower but that would still be enough to secure a double pole position, that second-fastest time 0.055s faster than Foster’s.
With a year-and-a-half’s experience in the series so far, Enzo Richer built up more gradually to his best time, which lifted him to third with just under 10 minutes remaining.
Fellow returnee Romain Andriolo was fourth, with Japanese rookie Hiyu Yamakoshi beating Enzo Peugeot to fifth.
Pol Lopez was a much-improved seventh, ahead of Belgian federation-backed Yani Stevenheydens and Louis Schlesser, son of Jean-Louis. Romanian Radical convert Luca Savu spun and stopped at Turn 9 late on, bringing out the yellow flags, but still rounded out the top 10.
Qualifying round-up
Race 1 grid
1 Evan Giltaire 1m27.870s
2 Kevin Foster +0.282s
3 Enzo Richer +0.459s
4 Romain Andriolo +0.499s
5 Hiyu Yamakoshi +0.547s
6 Enzo Peugeot +0.554s
7 Pol Lopez +0.716s
8 Yani Stevenheydens +0.920s
9 Louis Schlesser +0.933s
10 Luca Savu +0.992s
Race 3 grid
1 Giltaire 1m28.163s
2 Foster +0.055s
3 Andriolo +0.212s
4 Richer +0.268s
5 Yamakoshi +0.280s
6 Lopez +0.433s
7 Peugeot +0.488s
8 Stevenheydens +0.720s
9 Garrett Berry +0.755s
10 Leonardo Megna +0.769s