F3 Austria: Hadjar seals pole after red flag ends qualifying early

The Red Bull junior, who won the sprint race at Silverstone last weekend, took the top spot for Hitech with three minutes left of the session, setting a 1m19.759s. 

Other drivers were on course to set their final lap times of the session before Zdanec Chovanec locked up at Turn 1, attempting to avoid the sausage kerb before running wide and coming to a stop, prompting the red flag. 

The early ending left many drivers unable to improve, including championship leader Victor Martins (ART), who was forced to settle for second, less than 0.2s behind his compatriot. 

Prema Racing’s Ollie Bearman took third, with teammate Arthur Leclerc in fourth, the Silverstone feature race winner having led this morning’s practice session. 

Jonny Edgar was first out the pits in his Trident, heading out for qualifying in his second race weekend back after illness. 

Martins was first to top the timesheet, setting a 1m19.980s on his maiden attempt as the only driver to break the 1m20s barrier. 

Bearman went straight into second, less than 0.1s behind, while Kaylen Frederick was third for Hitech. 

The yellow flags were waved briefly 10 minutes into the session after Chovanec stopped right at the pit entry in a bizarre incident for which he will be investigated after the session. 

Leclerc moved up from seventh to third on his next attempt, with a 1m20.100s demoting Frederick. 

The field dived into the pits, re-emerging with seven minutes left on the clock and causing traffic around the final corner as they jostled for position. 

With three minutes remaining, Hadjar snatched the top spot, demoting Martins and Bearman to their final positions before Chovanec’s off ended the session with two minutes left. Moments earlier, ART’s Gregoire Saucy also ran off into the gravel trap. 

Frederick took fifth place, with Trident’s Roman Stanek in sixth and Edgar in seventh. Zane Maloney (Trident), Van Amersfoort Racing’s Franco Colapinto and Jak Crawford (Prema) rounded off the top 10.  

MP Motorsport’s Caio Collet will start on pole for Saturday’s reverse-grid sprint race, with Juan Manuel Correa in second for ART and Crawford in third. 

Bearman faces an investigation for an unsafe release involving Carlin’s Zak O’Sullivan, while David Vidales will be investigated for erratic driving during the final dash to the line. 

F3 Austria - Qualifying results:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	18	Isack Hadjar	HitechGP	1'19.759
2	7	Victor Martins	ART Grand Prix	1'19.980	0.221
3	6	Oliver Bearman	Prema Powerteam	1'20.058	0.299
4	4	Arthur Leclerc	Prema Powerteam	1'20.069	0.310
5	17	Kaylen Frederick	HitechGP	1'20.134	0.375
6	2	Roman Staněk	Trident	1'20.178	0.419
7	1	Jonny Edgar	Trident	1'20.199	0.440
8	3	Zane Maloney	Trident	1'20.290	0.531
9	29	Franco Colapinto	Van Amersfoort Racing	1'20.297	0.538
10	5	Jak Crawford	Prema Powerteam	1'20.351	0.592
11	9	Juan Manuel Correa	ART Grand Prix	1'20.380	0.621
12	10	Caio Collet	MP Motorsport	1'20.421	0.662
13	23	Ido Cohen	Jenzer Motorsport	1'20.431	0.672
14	25	William Alatalo	Jenzer Motorsport	1'20.433	0.674
15	26	Zak O'Sullivan	Carlin	1'20.510	0.751
16	11	Alexander Smolyar	MP Motorsport	1'20.516	0.757
17	28	Enzo Trulli	Carlin	1'20.568	0.809
18	8	Gregoire Saucy	ART Grand Prix	1'20.591	0.832
19	20	David Vidales	Campos Racing	1'20.607	0.848
20	22	Pepe Martí	Campos Racing	1'20.668	0.909
21	31	Reece Ushijima	Van Amersfoort Racing	1'20.747	0.988
22	19	Nazim Azman	HitechGP	1'20.782	1.023
23	21	Hunter Yeany	Campos Racing	1'20.859	1.100
24	16	Francesco Pizzi	Charouz Racing System	1'20.868	1.109
25	30	Rafael Villagomez	Van Amersfoort Racing	1'20.927	1.168
26	12	Kush Maini	MP Motorsport	1'21.098	1.339
27	27	Brad Benavides	Carlin	1'21.304	1.545
28	24	Federico Malvestiti	Jenzer Motorsport	1'21.370	1.611
29	14	László Tóth	Charouz Racing System	1'22.566	2.807
30	15	Zdenek Chovanec	Charouz Racing System	1'27.895	8.136
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