Formula 2: Alex Dunn confidently won in Spa.

      As is always the case in youth series, the battle for pole position is of a principled nature since the best qualifying lap earns bonus points, and given the close results this season in F2, this is quite an important factor.

      The weather at Spa on Friday afternoon was unusually Belgian – the sun was shining, and there were no particular difficulties related to external conditions, allowing drivers to show their maximum potential along with their cars.

      One of the first to lead the qualifying protocol was Alex Dann, but Leonardo Fornaroli was only slightly behind him. In his second attempt, the Italian tried to surpass the Rodin Motorsport driver, but he responded convincingly, setting the best sector times in all three sectors with a time of 1:57.863 in the first half of the session.

      Moreover, this result from the McLaren youth program participant was over 0.4 seconds better than Fornaroli’s time, and over half a second ahead of the results shown by two other regular pole contenders – Gabriel Mini and Victor Martinez. Before qualifying began, French ART driver Marten even claimed he would be the fastest today, but he had yet to confirm this.

      With less than nine minutes remaining until the end of the session, drivers, having received fresh soft tires, returned to the track to make a decisive push for pole. However, even at this stage, Dann made it clear that it was impossible to beat him today: he improved his previous time by a whole seven-tenths!

      The others also improved, and unexpectedly, Ritou Miata moved up to second place, although his time was 0.419 seconds slower. Nonetheless, this was the Japanese driver’s best qualifying result in F2. His teammate, Martin, remained fourth. Surprisingly, Richard Verschor, the points leader, failed entirely to reach the top ten, posting only 11th time.

      Thus, Alex Dann will start from pole on Sunday for the main race of the weekend, while tomorrow’s sprint will be starting from the most advantageous position by Oliver Götte, who qualified tenth. However, as we know, a pole at Spa is a prestigious achievement, but its significance should not be exaggerated, as overtakes are most likely on this track.