After the Coppa Shell, it was the turn of the Ferrari Challenge Europe Trofeo Pirelli protagonists to thrash it out for pole position in the first qualifying session of the Imola final round, sharing the track with the contenders for the Asia Pacific trophy.
At the end of a session that was interrupted due to the presence of gravel at the Rivazza, it was Thomas Neubauer who topped the timesheets. The Frenchman, without any particular championship ambitions, was able to set a time of 1m42.311s, which put him on pole for this afternoon’s race 1.
His closest rival, just a whisker behind, was Italian Eliseo Donno, who was also on good form today. The second row of the grid for the race sees two of the favourites, 2022 champion Doriane Pin, who clinched the title in the previous round at Mugello, and the outgoing champion Luka Nurmi from Finland, both just under half-a-second behind.
The Finn’s main aim this weekend will be to finish runner-up in the Challenge Europe, not an easy task because he will have to make up the 25-point gap on Belgium’s John Wartique, who will start right behind him, despite being over a second from pole.
The top 5 however all proved their worth in Q1 as they were able to finish ahead of the ex-F1 driver Adrian Sutil in sixth place. Behind him, the battle for pole in the AM class was a hard-fought one between Denmark’s Christian Brunsborg who just edged out Marco Pulcini by a fraction. Champion Ange Barde was down in eleventh place.
Japanese driver Nobuhiro Imada set a good lap today to grab the pole amongst the protagonists of the Challenge Asia Pacific with tenth quickest time, finishing 1.2 seconds clear of his rival in this particular grouping, Yudai Uchida, who was 19th overall.
In the Coppa Shell Asia, pole position went to Kanji Yagura with a time of 1m46.352s, which put him in 22nd overall, but above all allowed him to reduce to 18 points the gap in the standings to leader Kazayuki Yamaguchi. In the Coppa Shell AM, pole went to Baby Kei, the Japanese driver continuing his run of good form after taking the double win in the last round at Mugello.
FERRARI CHALLENGE RESULTS - Imola: Q1 Trofeo Pirelli EU-APAC
