Fornaroli boosts title chances with feature race pole · RaceFans

Formula 3 championship leader Leonardo Fornaroli secured a vital pole position for Sunday’s feature race in the final round of the season in Monza.

The Trident driver set the quickest overall time in group qualifying to secure the top spot on the grid for Sunday’s race, which is likely decide the championship.

Gabriele Mini will start third on the grid after Alex Dunne secured a front row start after setting the quickest time in the second qualifying group.

Group A

After last year’s F3 qualifying session at Monza and the previous round in Spa-Francorchamps produced dangerous amounts of bunching with drivers trying to avoid giving a slipstream to their rivals, the FIA split qualifying into two groups of 15 drivers. Using the same system as in Monaco, the 15 even-numbered drivers would participate in the first session and the remaining odd-numbered drivers in the second, with the results of both merged together.

Several championship contenders took part in the opening session, including championship leaders Leonardo Fornaroli, Gabriele Mini and Luke Browning. After a slow start to the session, the field of 15 began to take to the track, but a traffic jam emerged between the two Lesmos as drivers refused to provide a tow to their rivals behind. That led to exactly the kind of traffic jam that the group session was intended to avoid, with Laurens van Hoepens hitting the back of Kacper Sztuka, damaging both cars and triggering a red flag.

When the session resumed, Joshua Dufek set the fastest time ahead of Mari Boya with Sergio Ramos third. On the second lap, Fornaroli improved to take the fastest time of the first group, while Mini moved up into second as Ramos took third. Williams junior Luke Browning was only seventh after being caught behind Max Esterson for his final laps, meaning he will start both races from the seventh row.

Group B

The second and final session saw the lower three championship contenders, Arvid Lindblad, Dino Beganovic and Christian Mansell, all running together. All the drivers waited until the several minutes into the session until heading out for the first rime, when all 15 cars emerged together.

Predictably, the entire pack of cars bunched up on the run to Ascari until Mansell, at the head of the train, eventually pulled away but abandoned his lap out of the Ascari chicane to try and tuck in behind Nikola Tsolov as several others backed off to prioritise their final laps.

Alex Dunne was one of those completed his first push lap, going quickest with a 1’38.818 with Sami Meguetounif behind him. However, none of those who abandoned their first laps were able to beat Dunne’s time, with Sebastian Montoya the best of those in third.

Dunne was confirmed as quickest, but will start second for Sunday’s feature race as his best time was not as fast as Fornaroli’s. Mini will therefore start third, Mansell in eighth, Beganovic in tenth and Browning down in 13th for both races. Lindblad will have the worst starting position of the championship contenders in 18th.

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Formula 3 Italy combined qualifying results

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