Three in a row for Piastri as the Aussie claims yet another pole position ahead of F2’s Feature Race at the Sochi Autodrom

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Oscar Piastri stormed to a third consecutive pole position as the Prema driver extends his championship lead by an extra four points.

Jehan Daruvala, Theo Pourchaire and championship contender Guanyu Zhou all tried to displace Piastri but the Aussie’s qualifying dominance continues as he was close to two-tenths quicker than his closest challenger.

As It Happened

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Christian Lundgaard was the first driver to appear out of the pit lane as the rest of the grid followed him onto the track moments later.

The Dane set the first competitive lap of the session with a 1:48.969, but his time was quickly eclipsed by Jake Hughes who moved his HWA onto provisional pole position.

Ralph Boschung went almost seven-tenths quicker than Hughes as he stripped the Brit of provisional pole position with Felipe Drugovich and Zhou moving up to second and third respectively.

Drivers improved during their second runs as Piastri topped the qualifying session, however, Zhou went a tenth quicker to snatch the top spot away from the Prema driver.

With 17 minutes to go, the drivers returned to the pit lane to review the data and prepare themselves ahead of their final runs in qualifying.

Five minutes later, the cars appeared back onto the track for their build laps with the pole position shootout finely poised.

Piastri reclaimed provisional pole position by three-hundredths as his Prema teammate Robert Shwartzman moved into third after a huge improvement on his previous best lap time.

In the dying embers of qualifying, drivers continued to improve but so did championship leader Piastri as he went to the top once more to claim his third consecutive pole position.

Daruvala qualified second, two-tenths slower than the Aussie, with Pourchaire claiming third. Zhou followed in fourth, Boschung in fifth, Hughes in sixth, Shwartzman in seventh, Liam Lawson in eighth, Juri Vips in ninth and Dan Ticktum in 10th.

What’s Next?

After a sunny qualifying session, the first race of the F2 weekend is set to be a wet one. Dan Ticktum will start from provisional pole position after qualifying 10th for Sunday’s Feature Race. The Carlin driver is joined by Juri Vips on the front row of the grid as the Brit sets his sight on yet another Sprint Race victory this season.

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