Photo: Florent Gooden / DPPI
15-year-old Felix Hirsiger was fastest in opening qualifying session of the 2014 French F4 season at Le Mans, taking pole for the third race of the weekend.
Hirsiger, who secured the maiden pole position of his career, was 0.15s faster than top karting graduate of the field – Australian Joseph Mawson.
Lasse Sorensen, Marco’s younger brother, and series returnee Amaury Richard qualified on the second row, with Frenchman Bryan Elpitiya, Russian driver Vladimir Atoev and Swede Reuben Kressner taking fifth, sixth and seventh in their respective first qualifying sessions.
17-year-old Valentin Moineault will start the third race of the season in eighth, followed by Finn Simo Laaksonen and Lotus’ karting prodigy Dorian Boccolacci.
The starting order for the first race, meanwhile, was determined by the second-best lap times of the session. As a result, Mawson grabbed pole for his first car race, beating Hirsiger by more than a tenth. Sorensen and Elpitiya took third and fourth respectively, while Moineault will start from fifth – three places better than his spot for race three. The top ten is rounded out by Richard, Atoev, Laaksonen, Boccolacci and Russian karting champion Denis Bulatov.
Session results
| Pos. | Race 3 | Time | Pos. | Race 1 | Time |
| 1 | Felix Hirsiger | 1:41.617 | 1 | Joseph Mawson | 1:41.818 |
| 2 | Joseph Mawson | 1:41.775 | 2 | Felix Hirsiger | 1:41.958 |
| 3 | Lasse Sorensen | 1:41.877 | 3 | Lasse Sorensen | 1:42.040 |
| 4 | Amaury Richard | 1:41.968 | 4 | Bryan Elpitiya | 1:42.050 |
| 5 | Bryan Elpitiya | 1:42.002 | 5 | Valentin Moineault | 1:42.172 |
| 6 | Vladimir Atoev | 1:42.047 | 6 | Amaury Richard | 1:42.362 |
| 7 | Reuben Kressner | 1:42.087 | 7 | Vladimir Atoev | 1:42.470 |
| 8 | Valentin Moineault | 1:42.121 | 8 | Simo Laaksonen | 1:42.530 |
| 9 | Simo Laaksonen | 1:42.212 | 9 | Dorian Boccolacci | 1:42.541 |
| 10 | Dorian Boccolacci | 1:42.357 | 10 | Denis Bulatov | 1:42.766 |
| 11 | Niclas Nylund | 1:42.656 | 11 | David Droux | 1:42.819 |
| 12 | David Droux | 1:42.673 | 12 | Erwan Jule | 1:42.854 |
| 13 | Erwan Jule | 1:42.722 | 13 | Reuben Kressner | 1:42.885 |
| 14 | Denis Bulatov | 1:42.740 | 14 | Valentin Hasse-Clot | 1:42.902 |
| 15 | Valentin Hasse-Clot | 1:42.885 | 15 | Niclas Nylund | 1:43.047 |
| 16 | Gjergj Haxhiu | 1:43.088 | 16 | Juan Manuel Jimenez | 1:43.385 |
| 17 | Juan Manuel Jimenez | 1:43.306 | 17 | Gjergj Haxhiu | 1:43.485 |
| 18 | Axel Matus | 1:44.005 | 18 | Joao Carvalho | 1:44.147 |
| 19 | Joao Carvalho | 1:44.071 | 19 | Axel Matus | 1:44.365 |
| 20 | Tom Soubiron | 1:44.657 | 20 | Tom Soubiron | 1:45.311 |
| 21 | Hugo Sugnot-Darniche | 1:45.377 | 21 | Hugo Sugnot-Darniche | 1:45.478 |
| 22 | Anouck Abadie | 1:51.248 | 22 | Anouck Abadie | 1:52.296 |
| 23 | Paul Hokfelt Jr | No Time | 23 | Paul Hokfelt Jr | No Time |