PIASTRI TAKES FOURTH SUCCESSIVE POLE

Australian Oscar Piastri has equalled the record by taking a fourth consecutive FIA Formula 2 Championship pole position at the brand-new Jeddah Street Circuit in Saudi Arabia.

By taking pole Piastri also further extended his lead over his nearest challenger Guanyu Zhou in the championship by a further four points.

With a 1m 40.878s time the Victorian took pole from his Prema Racing teammate Robert Schwartzman by 0.165s.

Piastri’s FIA Formula 3 Championship rival Theo Pourchaire was third fastest but well over a quarter of a second behind, he was 0.34s off Piastri’s time.

Around the 6.174km track under the lights, it was these three that fought for pole throughout the session.

After the completion of their first runs, it was Schwartzman who broke the 1m 41s barrier to first, while Piastri went to P2 beneath him for P2 shortly after.

Pourchaire briefly nabbed first, but the Russian stole it back with another fastest lap, slicing the fastest time to a 1m 41.355s time.

By the end of the final runs however Piastri found that little bit more and ended the session with his fourth straight pole.

His closest title rival Zhou had been struggling down in ninth in the first half of the session, on the first lap of the second run he leapt to third, however as the time ticked down he was demoted to sixth place.

The other Australian Jack Doohan on his FIA Formula 2 Championship debut qualified in 16th of the 22 starters in his MP Motorsport machine.

Christian Lundgaard secured his best qualifying result since the opening round of the season in fourth.

Brazilian Felipe Drugovich beat his Uni-Virtuosi teammate Zhou to fifth.

Ralph Boschung was seventh ahead of Juri Vips and the two Kiwi’s Marcos Armstrong and Liam Lawson who will start on reverse grid pole ahead in Sprint Race 1.

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