Gommendy Takes First Pole

The Frenchman lapped the former Portuguese Grand Prix venue in 1m 25.321 seconds, as he beat his batch of runners in the opening 15-minute session.

Gommendy will start alongside Carlin Motorsport's Andreas Zuber, who topped his batch of runners in the second session.

Because the average of the fastest times in both sessions was outside the permitted limits to determine the grid on qualifying times alone, the runners in both sessions will start parallel on the grid tomorrow.

Runaway championship leader Kubica will start third, and should results go his way he could be crowned champion three races early. The Polish driver has a 44-point lead over Spaniard Adrain Valles, with 17 points maximum available for each race.

Double race winner Marcus Winkelhock will start fourth after finishing second to Zuber in the second session.

That session was interrupted with two red flags - the first to recover Milos Pavlovic's stricken GD Racing machine - and the next to recover Fabio Carbone's car from a gravel trap.

Nicolas Prost, son of four-time Formula One World Champion Alain, had a troubled session, going off the road twice on route to 24th on the grid.

Pos  Driver               Team                   Time
 1.  Tristan Gommendy     KTR                    1:25.321
 2.  Andreas Zuber        Carlin Motorsport      1:25.625
 3.  Robert Kubica        Epsilon Euskadi        1:25.529
 4.  Markus Winkelhock    Draco Multiracing Usa  1:26.008
 5.  Felix Porteiro       Epsilon Euskadi        1:25.710
 6.  Adrian Valles        Pons Racing            1:26.055
 7.  Colin Fleming        Jenzer Motorsport      1:25.956
 8.  Simon Pagenaud       DHG Saulnier Racing    1:26.393
 9.  Patrick Pilet        GD Racing              1:26.011
10.  Fabio Carbone        Eurointernational      1:26.412
11.  Will Power           Carlin Motorsport      1:26.020
12.  Jaap Van Lagen       KTR                    1:26.736
13.  Christian Montanari  Draco Multiracing Usa  1:26.204
14.  Celso Miguez         Pons Racing            1:26.863
15.  Fernando Rees        Interwetten            1:26.240
16.  Damien Pasini        Cram Competition       1:27.055
17.  Benjamin Hanley      Cram Competition       1:26.389
18.  Matteo Pellegrino    RC Motorsport          1:27.136
19.  Ryo Fukuda           DHG Saulnier Racing    1:26.609
20.  Pastor Maldonado     Dams                   1:27.140
21.  Ryan Sharp           Jenzer Motorsport      1:27.148
22.  Matteo Meneghello    Eurointernational      1:27.770
23.  Davide Rigon         Victory Engineering    1:27.463
24.  Nicolas Prost        Dams                   1:28.485
25.  Giovanni Tedeschi    RC Motorsport          1:27.561
26.  Ivan Bellarosa       Avelon Formula         1:28.805
27.  Mehdi Bennani        Avelon Formula         1:29.710