Qualifying report
FIA F2 Sochi
Sochi F2: Piastri pips Daruvala for pole position hat-trick
Formula 2 championship leader Oscar Piastri scored his third pole position in a row after pipping Jehan Daruvala in a frantic finish to qualifying at Sochi Autodrom.
Tom Howard
Edited: Sep 25, 2021, 1:51 AM
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Piastri saved his best until the final minute to log a 1m47.465s effort to edge Daruvala by 0.188s as a flurry of fast times arrived in the climax of qualifying.
The Australian was sitting second after the first run on the supersoft tyres behind title rival Guanyu Zhou, before moving to provisional pole in the final 10 minutes.
Daruvala then snatched the pole away from the Prema driver in the final minute, but Piastri had one last effort, which was enough to take the pole for Sunday’s feature race and claim the four championship points.
ART Grand Prix’s Theo Pourchaire climbed to third with his final effort, demoting Zhou to fourth while Ralph Boschung was fifth.
Dan Ticktum will start from pole for Saturday’s opening sprint race courtesy of the reversal of the top 10 from qualifying.
Qualifying began five minutes earlier than planned following a change to the weekend schedule that has resulted in bringing the opening Formula 3 race forward from Saturday to Friday afternoon due to concerns over weather.
HWA’s Jake Hughes, standing in for the injured Jack Aitken, set the initial pace with his first push lap on the super soft tyres, clocking a 1m48.915s.
However, times tumbled quickly after the second round of push laps as Boschung jumped to the top of the timesheets as he brought the session best down to a 1m48.264s.
Piastri was next to strike shaving another tenth from that before his title rival Zhou responded moments later as the Chinese driver became the first to dip into the 1m47s bracket.
At the halfway point, Zhou headed Piastri with Daruvala in third ahead of Boschung, Felipe Drugovich and Robert Shwartzman. The top 10 was completed by Christian Lundgaard, David Beckmann, Liam Lawson and Juri Vips, with only six tenths covering the group ahead of their second runs.
The final 10 minutes proved to be a frantic affair as drivers fought over clean air on track for their final laps.
Piastri didn’t waste any time as he fired his Prema to the top, edging Zhou by 0.025s, as Shwartzman jumped to third, while Lawson moved to fourth.
However, Daruvala immediately responded to take the spot away from the Prema driver, but it was short-lived as Piastri fired in a time to snatch pole at the death.
The top 10 was completed by Hughes, Shwartzman, Lawson, Vips and Ticktum.
The opening F2 sprint race of the weekend is scheduled to start on Saturday at 0730 GMT.
Sochi F2 - Qualifying results:
Cla # Driver Team Time Gap 1 2 Oscar Piastri
Prema Powerteam 1'47.465 2 6
Jehan Daruvala
Carlin 1'47.653 0.188 3 10
Theo Pourchaire
ART Grand Prix 1'47.891 0.426 4 3
Guanyu Zhou
UNI-Virtuosi 1'47.994 0.529 5 21
Ralph Boschung
Campos Racing 1'48.024 0.559 6 22
Jake Hughes
HWA Racelab 1'48.073 0.608 7 1 Robert Shwartzman
Prema Powerteam 1'48.098 0.633 8 7
Liam Lawson
HitechGP 1'48.129 0.664 9 8
Jüri Vips
HitechGP 1'48.139 0.674 10 5
Dan Ticktum
Carlin 1'48.171 0.706 11 17
Marcus Armstrong
DAMS 1'48.190 0.725 12 9
Christian Lundgaard
ART Grand Prix 1'48.255 0.790 13 4
Felipe Drugovich
UNI-Virtuosi 1'48.286 0.821 14 20
David Beckmann
Campos Racing 1'48.428 0.963 15 11
Richard Verschoor
MP Motorsport 1'48.587 1.122 16 24
Bent Viscaal
Trident 1'48.662 1.197 17 12
Lirim Zendeli
MP Motorsport 1'48.785 1.320 18 16
Roy Nissany
DAMS 1'48.989 1.524 19 15
Guilherme Samaia
Charouz Racing System 1'49.226 1.761 20 25
Marino Sato
Trident 1'49.339 1.874 21 14
Enzo Fittipaldi
Charouz Racing System 1'49.465 2.000 22 23
Alessio Deledda
HWA Racelab 1'50.389 2.924 View full results
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