Written by Juan Arroyo
Leonardo Fornaroli took his maiden pole position in FIA Formula 3 on Friday afternoon in a dominant display from Trident.
Long queues formed in the final sector of the circuit during the initial stages as drivers attempted their first laps. Minì was the first to get on the board with a 1:46.619, but was immediately beaten by teammate Luke Browning.
Bortoleto split the pair with just 0.056s difference to Browning. The Brazilian was then followed by Goethe, Aron, Colapinto and Fornaroli as the grid began to set their times.
Eight minutes into the session, Dino Beganovic pulled into the pits with smoke coming out of his PREMA's exhaust. Aron stormed to provisional pole with a 1:46.191, ahead of Browning by just 0.059s. Bortoleto, Goethe, Mansell, O'Sullivan followed behind. Jenzer also looked in a strong position at the halfway mark as Taylor Barnard broke into the top 10. Fornaroli gambled on running without slipstream from the established sequence and snatched P1 with a 1:45.717, four tenths clear of Aron. Marí Boya stormed to P3 ahead of Browning, but the former's lap was deleted, and Boya was demoted back to P20. Despite a troubled final sector, Goethe improved to P4, nearly half a second off his Trident teammate Fornaroli. With 10 minutes to go, most drivers opted to run a second set of hard tyres. More queues formed as Sebastian Montoya was the first to set a lap, improving to P7.
Minì and Browning shot up into P2 and P3 respectively with three minutes to go, but another improvement from Aron, helped by being quickest in final sector, demoted the Hitech pair. Fornaroli's time remained unbeaten with one minute to go. Fornaroli slightly improved on his previous lap with a 1:45.520 when he took the chequered flag, as Goethe improved to P2. Bortoleto jumped to third but was quickly demoted by Campos' Pepe Martí and Christian Mansell.
Full Qualifying results:
L. Fornaroli (Trident)
O. Goethe (Trident)
J. Martí (Campos)
C. Mansell (Campos)
G. Bortoleto (Trident)
P. Aron (PREMA)
G. Minì (Hitech)
L. Browning (Hitech)
F. Colapinto (MP Motorsport)
T. Barnard (Jenzer)
M. Boya (MP Motorsport)
J. Edgar (MP Motorsport)
S. Montoya (Hitech)
G. Saucy (ART)
H. Barter (Campos)
Z. O'Sullivan (PREMA)
C. Collet (Van Amersfoort Racing)
K. Frederick (ART)
N. Bedrin (Jenzer)
M. Cresswell (PHM Racing)
R. Villagomez (Van Amersfoort Racing)
T. Smith (Van Amersfoort Racing)
N. Tsolov (ART)
Max Esterson (Rodin Carlin)
O. Gray (Rodin Carlin)
I. Cohen (Rodin Carlin)
A. Garcia (Jenzer)
S. Floersch (PHM Racing)
R. Faria (PHM Racing)
D. Beganovic (PREMA)