The 30-minute Qualifying session for the fifth and penultimate round of the French F4 Championship was certainly not lacking in excitement. The Pirelli tyres performed well over several laps at the Lédenon circuit, and the drivers took advantage of various moments to set their best times on a completely dry track.
On the fifth lap Arthur Dorison set an initial benchmark time of 1:21.712, which was quickly beaten by Championship leader Alex Munoz with a time of 1:21.458, ahead of Germany’s Montego Maassen and Louis Iglesias. Although the Academy drivers were then slowed down by a red flag, they returned to a fast track when it was waved again, with Jules Roussel taking advantage to improve his time to 1:21.425. It took a few minutes for Dorison to regain the lead with a time of 1:21.349 ahead of Roussel and Munoz. The top three remained unchanged, meaning that the young Norman will start from pole position in Race 1 for the first time in his career.
Many drivers missed out on a fast lap by returning to the pits to cool their tyres, in order to make the most of the final minutes to move up the rankings. This worked for Rayan Caretti, who moved up to 5th place just behind Iglesias, who was one of the drivers to get the better of Maassen, as was Guillaume Bouzar, who finished 5th ahead of the German driver.
It is worth noting that the top five in the current F4 Academy standings set the five fastest times in this session.
Malo Bolliet came in 8th, ahead of Japan’s Rintaro Sato and Rafaël Perard. Perard will therefore start from pole position in Race 2, in accordance with the reverse grid principle. As for the starting grid for Race 3, which is determined by each driver’s second best lap time in the session, it will be similar to that of Race 1 for the drivers on the front row
