Prema Powerteam’s Esteban Ocon led a 1-2 for the Italian team in the second qualifying session for the opening round of the FIA F3 European Championship’s 2014 season at Silverstone.
The Lotus F1 junior took over at the top halfway through the session and would prove unreachable to his competition throughout the remainder of the session.
He would also claim pole for race three in style, one-upping his benchmark lap by 0.005s with two minutes to go to ensure that both his best times were quicker than those of his competitors.
Canadian Nicholas Latifi had his best qualifying in the series, rounding out a Prema 1-2 in the timesheets. Race one poleman Tom Blomqvist and Antonio Fuoco settled on row two.
Antonio Giovinazzi was another driver to beat his own qualifying record in FIA F3 with fifth place, with karting graduate Max Verstappen taking sixth.
Jordan King wound up seventh, narrowly ahead of Dennis van de Laar, who made it four Prema cars in the top ten. F3 Open champion Ed Jones took ninth, while Mitch Gilbert denied his teammate John Bryant-Meisner tenth place by five thousandths of a second.
Session results
Pos. | Race 2 | Time | Pos. | Race 3 | Time |
1 | Esteban Ocon | 1:51.322 | 1 | Esteban Ocon | 1:51.327 |
2 | Nicholas Latifi | 1:51.460 | 2 | Antonio Fuoco | 1:51.557 |
3 | Tom Blomqvist | 1:51.517 | 3 | Tom Blomqvist | 1:51.577 |
4 | Antonio Fuoco | 1:51.536 | 4 | Nicholas Latifi | 1:51.777 |
5 | Antonio Giovinazzi | 1:51.755 | 5 | Max Verstappen | 1:51.810 |
6 | Max Verstappen | 1:51.808 | 6 | Antonio Giovinazzi | 1:51.894 |
7 | Jordan King | 1:51.857 | 7 | Ed Jones | 1:51.982 |
8 | Dennis van de Laar | 1:51.864 | 8 | Dennis van de Laar | 1:51.990 |
9 | Ed Jones | 1:51.907 | 9 | Mitchell Gilbert | 1:52.096 |
10 | Mitchell Gilbert | 1:51.993 | 10 | Lucas Auer | 1:52.147 |
11 | John Bryant-Meisner | 1:51.998 | 11 | Jordan King | 1:52.147 |
12 | Lucas Auer | 1:51.999 | 12 | John Bryant-Meisner | 1:52.181 |
13 | Felix Rosenqvist | 1:52.104 | 13 | Gustavo Menezes | 1:52.230 |
14 | Gustavo Menezes | 1:52.116 | 14 | Felix Rosenqvist | 1:52.277 |
15 | Spike Goddard | 1:52.367 | 15 | Spike Goddard | 1:52.375 |
16 | Felix Serralles | 1:52.393 | 16 | Felix Serralles | 1:52.491 |
17 | Felipe Guimaraes | 1:52.431 | 17 | Jake Dennis | 1:52.566 |
18 | Jake Dennis | 1:52.518 | 18 | Hector Hurst | 1:52.715 |
19 | Riccardo Agostini | 1:52.533 | 19 | Riccardo Agostini | 1:52.757 |
20 | Alexander Toril | 1:52.672 | 20 | Alexander Toril | 1:52.799 |
21 | Roy Nissany | 1:52.674 | 21 | Felipe Guimaraes | 1:52.813 |
22 | Hector Hurst | 1:52.689 | 22 | Sean Gelael | 1:52.818 |
23 | Sean Gelael | 1:52.746 | 23 | Roy Nissany | 1:52.936 |
24 | Jules Szymkowiak | 1:52.896 | 24 | Jules Szymkowiak | 1:53.014 |
25 | Tatiana Calderon | 1:53.056 | 25 | Tatiana Calderon | 1:53.098 |
26 | Michele Beretta | 1:53.301 | 26 | Michele Beretta | 1:53.383 |