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Gutierrez crashes but takes pole

Esteban Gutierrez will start from pole for today's GP3 feature race in Valencia despite crashing late in qualifying this morning and forcing the session to be ended early

The current series leader took the top spot from Status driver Robert Wickens with eight minutes remaining, and was looking to improve his time of 1m58.653s when he hit the wall at the exit of Turn 5 and damaged the rear of his car, which came to a stop in the middle of the track.

Coincidentally Wickens had done almost exactly the same thing at the same place moments before and got away with it, but Gutierrez was unable to continue and the session was red-flagged to allow his car to be recovered. With just three minutes left on the clock, there was no time for a restart.

The final grid is still to be decided as up to nine drivers could face grid penalties for setting their best times during yesterday's free practice session under yellows, although the penalties were still yet to be confirmed when qualifying got underway.

As it stands at the moment, series newcomer Roberto Merhi will start from second on the grid after crossing the line just seconds before the session was ended, relegating Wickens to third alongside Michael Christensen.

Pos  Driver                Team       Time       Gap
 1.  Esteban Gutierrez     ART        1m58.653s
 2.  Roberto Merhi         Atech CRS  1m58.709s  + 0.056s
 3.  Robert Wickens        Status     1m58.916s  + 0.263s
 4.  Michael Christensen   MW Arden   1m58.986s  + 0.333s
 5.  Jean-Eric Vergne      Tech 1     1m59.041s  + 0.388s
 6.  Felipe Guimaraes      Addax      1m59.076s  + 0.423s
 7.  Nigel Melker          RSC Mucke  1m59.107s  + 0.454s
 8.  Rio Haryanto          Manor      1m59.370s  + 0.717s
 9.  Miki Monras           MW Arden   1m59.385s  + 0.732s
10.  Stefano Coletti       Tech 1     1m59.457s  + 0.804s
11.  Alexander Rossi       ART        1m59.558s  + 0.905s
12.  Doru Sechelariu       Tech 1     1m59.589s  + 0.936s
13.  Tobias Hegewald       RSC Mucke  1m59.669s  + 1.016s
14.  Oliver Oakes          Atech CRS  1m59.817s  + 1.164s
15.  Pal Varhaug           Jenzer     1m59.855s  + 1.202s
16.  Pablo Sanchez Lopez   Addax      1m59.868s  + 1.215s
17.  Josef Newgarden       Carlin     1m59.946s  + 1.293s
18.  Nico Muller           Jenzer     1m59.954s  + 1.301s
19.  Leonardo Cordeiro     MW Arden   2m00.049s  + 1.396s
20.  Simon Trummer         Jenzer     2m00.059s  + 1.406s
21.  Mirko Bortolotti      Addax      2m00.070s  + 1.417s
22.  Dean Smith            Carlin     2m00.119s  + 1.466s
23.  Renger van der Zande  RSC Mucke  2m00.151s  + 1.498s
24.  Pedro Nunes           ART        2m00.258s  + 1.605s
25.  Daniel Morad          Status     2m00.413s  + 1.760s
26.  James Jakes           Manor      2m00.542s  + 1.889s
27.  Adrian Quaife-Hobbs   Manor      2m00.616s  + 1.963s
28.  Ivan Lukashevich      Status     2m00.729s  + 2.076s
29.  Vittorio Ghirelli     Atech CRS  2m00.865s  + 2.212s
30.  Lucas Foresti         Carlin     2m00.880s  + 2.227s

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