Championship leader Callum Ilott took his second FIA Formula 2 pole position in a row by topping Friday’s qualifying session in Barcelona.
The Virtuosi driver pipped early pacesetter and chief title rival Robert Shwartzman to top spot by 0.183s, while ART’s Christian Lundgaard – sitting third in the championship – qualified down in 14th place.
Prema’s Shwartzman – looking to bounce back from a disastrous couple of weekends at Silverstone in which he only scored points in one out of four races, set the pace in the first half of the session with a time 1m28.862 – with Ilott 0.025s behind in second.
Guanyu Zhou, who opted to stay in the pits for the first few minutes, jumped ahead of his Virtuosi team-mate Ilott into second with a lap halfway through the session.
But Ilott responded on his second run to go fastest by almost half a second with a time of 1m28.381s.
Shwartzman and Zhou both improved on their final runs, but remained second and third fastest respectively.
MP Motorsport’s Felipe Drugovich was fourth fastest, a late effort putting him ahead of Prema’s Mick Schumacher.
Carlin’s Yuki Tsunoda, who won last Sunday’s sprint race at Silverstone, qualified in sixth, ahead of Jack Aitken – double podium finisher last time out – for Campos.
Dan Ticktum, who set the pace in Friday’s free practice session, was eighth fastest ahead of Hitech’s Nikita Mazepin.
Louis Deletraz rounded out the top ten for Charouz in a session where the top 15 drivers were separated by one second.
Qualifying result
| 1 | Callum Ilott | Virtuosi | 1m28.381s |
| 2 | Robert Shwartzman | Prema | +0.183s |
| 3 | Guanyu Zhou | Virtuosi | +0.220s |
| 4 | Felipe Drugovich | MP Motorsport | +0.386s |
| 5 | Mick Schumacher | Prema | +0.508s |
| 6 | Yuki Tsunoda | Carlin | +0.522s |
| 7 | Jack Aitken | Campos | +0.598s |
| 8 | Dan Ticktum | DAMS | +0.605s |
| 9 | Louis Deletraz | Charouz | +0.652s |
| 10 | Nikita Mazepin | Hitech | +0.818s |
| 11 | Artem Markelov | HWA | +0.916s |
| 12 | Jehan Daruvala | Carlin | +0.927s |
| 13 | Sean Gelael | DAMS | +0.935s |
| 14 | Christian Lundgaard | ART | +0.952s |
| 15 | Roy Nissany | Trident | +1.088s |
| 16 | Marino Sato | Trident | +1.112s |
| 17 | Pedro Piquet | Charouz | +1.143s |
| 18 | Nobuharu Matsushita | MP Motorsport | +1.260s |
| 19 | Marcus Armstrong | ART | +1.305s |
| 20 | Luca Ghiotto | Hitech | +1.309s |
| 21 | Giuliano Alesi | HWA | +1.367s |
| 22 | Guilherme Samaia | Campos | +1.712s |
Feature image credit: @fia_f2 official twitter
