Invicta Racing’s Leonardo Fornaroli will start the Formula 2 Feature Race from pole position after he snatched back the fastest lap time in Bahrain from Victor Martins.
The Italian racing driver grabbed his first podium in the series in the previous round, finishing second in the Melbourne Sprint Race.
He continued his impressive start by going fastest around the Bahrain International Circuit ahead of ART Grand Prix’s Martins.
Luke Browning rounded off the top three for Hitech, and F2 championship leader Joshua Durksen will start on pole for Saturday’s Sprint Race after qualifying in 10th place.
Fornaroil on top to take F2 Feature Race pole
MP Motorsport delivered a one-two in the Bahrain F2 practice session, with Oliver Goethe leading team-mate Richard Verschoor.
However, after seven minutes, it was Martins who set the early benchmark in qualifying with a 1:45.110s ahead of Rodin Motorsport’s Alex Dunne by just 0.002s.
The reigning Formula 3 World Champion set a stunning lap time to take an early provisional pole position.
The Italian racing driver was 0.468s quicker than Martins as his team-mate Roman Stanek slipped into fourth, with the Prema Racing challenger of Gabriele Mini rounding off the top five in the opening stages.
Halfway through the session, only 11 drivers had set a competitive lap time due to deleted lap times and certain teams taking a slow approach to the qualifying session.
DAMS Lucas Oil’s Jak Crawford initially went fourth before dropping down to seventh as the rest of the grid set their first representative lap times.
Verschoor jumped up into second before Pepe Marti in the Campos Racing car surpassed him with a 1:44.865s, still 0.223s off from Fornaroli’s time.
Browning pipped Martins into fourth place, but Durksen remained in 19th place for AIX Racing.
The grid returned to the pits before heading back out for their final out laps with just over seven minutes left in the session.
Martins stormed to the top of the timing sheets after his final lap, going four-tenths quicker than the Invicta Racing driver.
However, Fornaroli hit back with another superb lap to take pole position with a lap time of 1:44.008s.
Martins had to settle for second as Browning pulled out a special lap from out of nowhere to go onto the second row and round out the top three.
Dunne qualified in fourth, Stanek in fifth, Verschoor in sixth and Sami Meguetounif in seventh for Trident.
Rafael Villagomez clinched eighth place for Van Amersfoort Racing late on with Dino Beganovic in ninth in the other Hitech car.
Finally, rounding off the top 10 was the Paraguayan racing driver Durksen, as he now looks to make it back-to-back Sprint Race victories tomorrow.
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