Ayumu Iwasa appeared in the final minutes of Formula 2 qualifying at the Hungaroring to overtake Marcus Armstrong and secure pole. Jack Doohan starts at the front of the sprint race
Formula 2 has a new pole-position! Ayumu Iwasa, who had been hitting the crossbar for a few races, flew around the Hungaroring track on Friday afternoon (29) and took the pole position in the main race of the weekend in Hungary. Iwasa had to beat a very fast Marcus Armstrong and the line of title contenders to achieve the feat.
Armstrong was also fast and leading with a time of 1min28s311 when Iwasa, like a hurricane, detonated the mark and went under 1min28s: 1min27s930. No one else managed to get even a mere thousandth of the time of the New Zealander, who starts second.
Behind him, a row with the three real candidates to the F2 title. Felipe Drugovich ends the day in profit, because he was third and kept those chasing the lead behind. Théo Pourchaire was fourth, while Logan Sargeant, who has been the leading name in the standings, was fifth.
Jüri Vips, Frederik Vesti, Dennis Hauger, Enzo Fittipaldi, and Jack Doohan rounded out the top-10. According to the reversed grid system for the sprint race, Doohan will start first and have Fittipaldi next to him on the front row.
GRANDE PRÊMIO follows LIVE and IN REAL TIME all the activities of the Hungarian GP weekend. On Saturday, the F2 sprint race is scheduled for 1 pm (GMT-3).
Check out how the standings went:
The late afternoon that Formula 2 faced to start qualifying and set the starting grid for the two races of the weekend in Hungary was quite a bit friendlier than what F1 saw, especially in the morning, when the track reached 56°C. Only 40°C warmed up the Hungaroring's asphalt for the start.
It was Marcus Armstrong who took the lead and opened the season's fast laps at the Hungarian circuit, but ART really came out on top: they put Frederik Vesti and Théo Pourchaire in the top two places momentarily.
There was, however, a championship leader ready and able to separate the two. Felipe Drugovich drove fast and managed to overtake at least Pourchaire, one of the two great rivals in the fight for the 2022 season title.
The other real contender for the title, Logan Sargeant, had been lapping quite fast after more than ten minutes of the session to get into the top three, but decided to comply with Carlin's wishes and dropped out to go into the pits to prepare for the final laps.
A surprising Olli Caldwell then entered the prism. A long way from the top positions in the season so far, the former Ferrari Academy student set a 1min28s803 on an almost empty track and took the lead.
The following minutes were empty and the preparation for the final ten minutes and laps that would really define who would be the pole position for the main race of the category this weekend.
With everyone back on track for the deciding moments, it was Armstrong who came out on top. The New Zealander's lap time of 1min28s311 took him into the lead with the rest of his rivals still having two laps to go.
Pourchaire and Sargeant, in that order, stuck in positions two and three, but Drugovich beat them both to move up to second. Only 0s080 separated the top five at that point: Armstrong, Drugovich, Pourchaire, Sargeant, and Jüri Vips.
But not for long. Ayumu Iwasa did a dominant lap from the first sector, with a little more than three minutes on the clock, and ended up becoming the only driver to lap under 1min28s: he did 1min27s930.
There was still time and people to lap, but no one could beat the best laps of the day in those final minutes. Pole, therefore, for Iwasa.