Guerrieri claims Magny-Cours pole

The ISR driver left it late to secure the top spot, completing a lap of 1m27.619s after the chequered flag to demote Albert Costa from the head of timesheets by 0.079 seconds.

Reigning Formula Renault 2.0 Eurocup champion Costa appeared content with second; the result being the Spaniard's first front row start in the series.

Former GP2 driver Nelson Panciatici was another to enjoy his strongest qualifying effort of the season. The Junior Lotus Racing man exploited his local knowledge to the full to take third.

Fastest on Friday, championship leader Mikhail Aleshin ended the morning in fourth for Carlin. While the Russian may have concerns over Guerrieri's progress in the title race, Aleshin's current closest rival Daniel Ricciardo could only manage 10th fastest for Tech 1 Racing.

In fifth place, Anton Nebylitskiy and KMP Racing were the surprise of package of qualifying. Like Guerrieri, the Russian left it until the dying seconds before springing up the order.

Jon Lancaster traded fastest times with Panciatici and Costa for much of the session. But the Fortec driver was in the pits for the final few minutes of the half hour, and was bumped to an eventual sixth place.

Jan Charouz crashed seven minutes into qualifying, damaging the front right of his P1 Motorsport machine. The Czech, who was on the podium in the LMP2 class at Le Mans last weekend, will start this afternoon's race from last position.

Pos  Driver             Team             Time       Gap
 1.  Esteban Guerrieri  ISR              1m27.619s
 2.  Albert Costa       Epsilon Euskadi  1m27.698s  + 0.079s
 3.  Nelson Panciatici  Junior Lotus     1m27.829s  + 0.210s
 4.  Mikhail Aleshin    Carlin           1m27.982s  + 0.363s
 5.  Anton Nebylitskiy  KMP              1m28.172s  + 0.553s
 6.  Jon Lancaster      Fortec           1m28.211s  + 0.592s
 7.  Filip Salaquarda   ISR              1m28.305s  + 0.686s
 8.  Brendon Hartley    Tech 1           1m28.428s  + 0.809s
 9.  Jake Rosenzweig    Carlin           1m28.482s  + 0.863s
10.  Daniel Ricciardo   Tech 1           1m28.521s  + 0.902s
11.  Stefano Coletti    Comtec           1m28.538s  + 0.919s
12.  Victor Garcia      KMP              1m28.573s  + 0.954s
13.  Nathanael Berthon  Draco            1m28.812s  + 1.193s
14.  Keisuke Kunimoto   Epsilon Euskadi  1m28.826s  + 1.207s
15.  Julian Leal        Draco            1m29.024s  + 1.405s
16.  Daniel Zampieri    Pons             1m29.107s  + 1.488s
17.  Federico Leo       Pons             1m29.192s  + 1.573s
18.  Greg Mansell       Comtec           1m29.218s  + 1.599s
19.  Daniil Move        Junior Lotus     1m29.447s  + 1.828s
20.  Walter Grubmuller  P1               1m29.494s  + 1.875s
21.  Sten Pentus        Fortec           1m29.529s  + 1.910s
22.  Sergio Canamasas   FHV Interwetten  1m29.817s  + 2.198s
23.  Bruno Mendez       FHV Interwetten  1m29.928s  + 2.309s
24.  Jan Charouz        P1               1m39.765s  + 12.146s