The seventh Qualifying session went underway as Campos Racing’s Nikola Tsolov stormed to claim his third pole-position of the year at the F3 British GP, full report and results below.
During Free Practice, it was Tsolov led the way with a 1:45.647—with Trident’s Charlie Wurz and MP Motorsport’s Tim Tramnitz who rounded up the Top 3. Starting off strong on Friday, the Bulgarian has seemingly carried his momentum into Silverstone. However, as practice drew to a close, concerns over track limits grew. In the latter stages of the session, officials deleted several drivers’ lap times—a situation all drivers would surely aim to avoid repeating during Qualifying.
After a triumphant Sunday in Austria that ended in misery for Tsolov, the Bulgarian has dropped to P3 in the Drivers’ Standings following his disqualification—28 points behind championship leader Rafael Câmara. As three rounds remain after Silverstone, the fight for the championship is well and truly on for the Top 3—Câmara, Tramnitz and Tsolov—with only 28 points separating them.
Its qualifying time at the British GP for F3!
30 minutes ticked down as majority of the grid headed out on track. Temperatures had risen since practice as it was now 43 degrees. All fighting for track position, many had opted to go for another preparatory lap before setting a representative lap.
First across the line to set-off on a push-lap was Noah Strømsted with Câmara following behind. A clean first lap for Strømsted saw him set the benchmark with a 1:46.522. However, it was not long before Câmara claimed his spot at the top with a 1:46.318.
Running wide on his lap, Noel Leon was the first driver to get a lap time deleted, relegating him to the bottom of the timings. However, on a storming lap, Tsolov had set a lap with three purple sectors and a time of 1:45.655. Not far behind from the Bulgarian was teammate Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak who slotted himself into P3 with a 1:46.050.
Meanwhile, Charlie Wurz had a small moment after suffering from a snap of oversteer and was forced to back out of his lap. However, an in-form Alessandro Giusti was on a flyer to slot him into P4 with a time of 1:46.155.
First runs completed, drivers headed back into pits
As the first runs of Qualifying completed, the pit lane was in full-action as drivers headed back to the pits for a new set of tyres. As the first flying laps were completed, Laurens van Hoepen, Nicola Lacorte, Ivan Domingues and Leon were the only drivers left yet to set a representative time.
Headed into Maggots and Becketts, Brad Benavides executed a confident lap to slot himself into P4. The Rodin cars appeared to have good pace. First of the Rodin’s across the line, Roman Bilinski managed to slot himself into P4 with a time of 1:46.098 as Callum Voisin was next to complete lap to improve to P9 with a 1:46.161.
Strømsted was improving on his next lap as he crossed the line with a time of 1:45.695. However, an extremely impressive lap from Câmara put some distance between himself and Tsolov as the Brazilian claimed his position at the top with a 1:45.176.
10 minutes remained
Unlike his teammates, Wurz had opted to not follow Câmara and Strømsted’s run plans. Executing a better lap, Wurz crossed the line with a time of 1:45.770 enough to put himself in P4. Trident lined up in P1, P3 and P4 provisionally.
Theopile Naël jumped from the bottom of the standings to the top as he crossed the line with a 1:45.522. Meanwhile, Gerard Xie was the next driver who had a lap time deleted. As drivers set-off on their final flying laps, all drivers were finding massive improvements. After losing his maiden position in Austria, Ugo Ugochukwu catapulted to P2 with a time of 1:45.066. A yellow-flag flew momentarily but it did not seem to affect any drivers on their fast-laps.
Martinius Stenshorne put himself into P2 with a 1:45.488. However, Tramnitz was next across the line to replace him. Tsolov found more improvements from his last lap to claim his position at the top. All eyes were on Câmara to see if he could beat the Bulgarian to pole. However, two tenths down from his last, it was not enough for the Brazilian to deny Tsolov his third pole-position of the year.
Final results for F3 British GP Qualifying:
- N. Tsolov
- U. Ugochukwu
- R. Câmara
- M. Boya
- T. Tramnitz
- C. Wurz
- M. Stenshorne
- L. Van Hoepen
- T. Naël
- N. Leon
- C. Ho
- T. Inthraphuvasak
- B. Benavides
- A. Giusti
- N. Strømsted
- B. Badoer
- R. Bilinski
- S. Ramos
- T. Taponen
- J. Wharton
- I. Domingues
- B. Del Pino
- L. Sharp
- M. Zagazeta
- C. Voisin
- N. Johnson
- N. Lacorte
- G. Xie
- N. Marinangeli
- J. Hedley