The 2026 FIA Formula 3 (F3) Championship returned to action at Spa-Francorchamps for Round 6 of the season, with the Belgian GP weekend beginning with a 45-minute Free Practice session.
Drivers were slow to head out onto the circuit in the opening stages, with the Van Amersfoort Racing trio of Hiyu Yamakoshi, Bruno del Pino and Enzo Deligny completing an initial lap before returning to the pits.
With 33 minutes remaining on the clock, the field began to filter out onto the track. The first competitive lap times came in around the 2:04s, although there was still plenty of time for the order to change.
Giusti was the first driver to dip into the 2:06s, setting a 2:06.895, but the timings continued to fluctuate as more drivers completed their first flying laps.
Freddie Slater then moved to the top of the timing screens with a 2:06.661, although Tuukka Taponen quickly displaced the TRIDENT driver with a 2:06.622.
Mattia Colnaghi slotted into third with a 2:06.771, while Ernesto Rivera followed closely behind with a 2:06.734.
The next set of flying laps saw PREMA Racing’s Louis Sharp briefly take over at the front with a 2:06.577. However, that lead was short-lived, as Maciej Gładysz and Pedro Clerot both went quicker, setting times of 2:06.551 and 2:06.550 respectively.
Slater then returned to the top of the order, opening up a two-tenths advantage over Clerot with a 2:06.311.
Last flying laps
With eight and a half minutes remaining on the clock, Louis Sharp led the field back out onto the circuit as drivers began their final flying laps ahead of Qualifying later that afternoon.
Théophile Naël, who had been down in P28, produced a significant improvement to move up to second place. His lap left him just 0.151 seconds behind Slater’s earlier benchmark.
With the Hard tyre not seeing any improvements on the final attempts, Slater remained at the top of the timing screens to finish Free Practice in P1.
Naël completed the session in second, with Clerot rounding out the top three. Gładysz and Rivera completed the top five.
Championship leader Ugo Ugochukwu finished sixth, with 23 drivers separated by less than one second to underline the competitiveness of the 2026 F3 grid. Louis Sharp, Taito Kato, Tuukka Taponen and Nicola Lacorte completed the top 10.
