Silverstone FR3.5: Lotus's Matthieu Vaxiviere dominates qualifying
Lotus Formula 1 junior driver Matthieu Vaxiviere set his fifth pole position of the season ahead of the final Formula Renault 3.5 race of the Silverstone weekend
The Frenchman's time of 1m39.828s was the fastest FR3.5 lap recorded during the meeting and a stunning 0.580 seconds quicker than championship leader Oliver Rowland, who joins Vaxiviere on the front row for Sunday afternoon's pitstop race.
Rowland, currently 29 points clear of Vaxiviere in the drivers' standings, had a massive tyre lock-up into Village on an early run and was atypically down in 15th until moving up late on, although Vaxiviere appeared destined for pole throughout qualifying.
Making his first FR3.5 appearance of the year, series returnee Nick Yelloly produced a fine effort to qualify third, a performance that also underlined the strong pace of the Charouz-run Lotus car.
However, Yelloly has a four-place grid penalty for failing to respect blue flags in Saturday's opening race, which promotes Arden race Nicholas Latifi to third.
Swede Gustav Malja was provisionally fourth, but the Strakka Racing driver dropped to 11th post-qualifying after his fastest lap was deleted for a track limits violation.
Draco racer Pietro Fantin, who recorded the fastest lap in Saturday's race one, completes the second row in fourth behind Canadian rookie Latifi.
Following the revisions to the results, race one victor Tio Ellinas moves up to fifth, ahead of DAMS' Red Bull junior Dean Stoneman, Yelloly and McLaren protege Nyck de Vries.
QUALIFYING TIMES:
Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Matthieu Vaxiviere | Lotus | 1m39.828s | - |
2 | Oliver Rowland | Fortec Motorsports | 1m40.408s | 0.580s |
3 | Nick Yelloly | Lotus | 1m40.559s | 0.731s |
4 | Nicholas Latifi | Arden Motorsport | 1m40.612s | 0.784s |
5 | Pietro Fantin | International Draco Racing | 1m40.656s | 0.828s |
6 | Tio Ellinas | Strakka Racing | 1m40.699s | 0.871s |
7 | Dean Stoneman | DAMS | 1m40.731s | 0.903s |
8 | Nyck de Vries | DAMS | 1m40.743s | 0.915s |
9 | Egor Orudzhev | Arden Motorsport | 1m40.820s | 0.992s |
10 | Jazeman Jaafar | Fortec Motorsports | 1m40.877s | 1.049s |
11 | Gustav Malja | Strakka Racing | 1m40.898s | 1.070s |
12 | Tom Dillmann | Jagonya Ayam with Carlin | 1m41.005s | 1.177s |
13 | Aurelien Panis | Tech 1 Racing | 1m41.175s | 1.347s |
14 | Roy Nissany | Tech 1 Racing | 1m41.479s | 1.651s |
15 | Sean Gelael | Jagonya Ayam with Carlin | 1m41.676s | 1.848s |
16 | Bruno Bonifacio | International Draco Racing | 1m41.804s | 1.976s |
17 | Alfonso Celis | AVF | 1m41.958s | 2.130s |
18 | Beitske Visser | AVF | 1m42.069s | 2.241s |
19 | Philo Paz Armand | Pons Racing | 1m43.005s | 3.177s |
20 | Will Bratt | Pons Racing | 1m43.538s | 3.710s |
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