Nirei Fukuzumi snatched his second pole position of the season at the Circuito de Jerez, with a last-gasp effort to deny ART team-mates and title rivals Jack Aitken and George Russell.
The session opened under gloriously sunny conditions, with everyone running straight out on track to get the fight underway.
Dorian Boccolacci set the pace straight out of the box before running wide and tagging the barriers at turn 10 before returning to the pitlane to check for damage, with a string of drivers sharing the top spot: Raoul Hyman, Marcos Siebert, Giuliano Alesi, Arjun Maini, Tatiana Calderon, Alessio Lorandi and Dan Ticktum all spent time in P1 before the ART machine got underway.
Aitken moved ahead to top the times, with Russell, Anthoine Hubert and Fukuzumi slotting in behind the Briton ahead of their second runs.
With five minutes remaining everyone headed out for a final attempt, with Russell taking provisional pole. The chequered flag dropped and it looked as though the Mercedes junior had done enough, but first Aitken then Fukuzumi improved, with the latter posting an unbeaten time of 1:30.678.
Ticktum ensured it wasn't an ART clean sweep at the front as he took P4, pushing Hubert back to P5 ahead of Lorandi, Boccolacci, Kari, Calderon and Steijn Schothorst in another tight session which saw the top 12 separated by just one second.
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