QUALIFYING: Yamakoshi seals maiden Pole Position in Spielberg

Hiyu Yamakoshi claimed the Aramco Pole Position Award in Spielberg, setting a 1:21.730 for Van Amersfoort Racing to take top spot in Qualifying.

The Japanese driver ran in the gap between the first and second runs of the majority, finding improvements where others couldn't. He finished ahead of Ugo Ugochukwu in P2 and Tuukka Taponen in third.

Noah Stromsted picked up from where he left off in Practice to go fastest early on, but his first time was beaten by several others.

Taito Kato, Alessandro Giusti and then Taponen all went quicker, with the Finn leading the pack on a 1:21.968 early on.

Stromsted recaptured top spot on his next attempt until Taponen once again went quicker, this time on a 1:21.775 to lead by 0.084s from the Dane.

Giusti, Kato and Kanato Le rounded out the top five as the field headed back into the pitlane for a second set of the Soft Pirelli tyres.

VAR opted to go early with all three of their drivers on the second run, and Yamakoshi improved to go provisionally fastest on a 1:21.730, teammate Bruno Del Pino aborted his lap to stay in P10, and Enzo Deligny climbed up to P12 with 10 minutes remaining.

Ahead of the final attempts, everyone was fighting to find an ideal track position in order to gain a slipstream down the long DRS zones at Turns 3 and 4.

ART Grand Prix found themselves clean air but couldn't trouble the time from Yamakoshi.

Uogchukwu found an improvement to go to P2, 0.015s down on the best time, and Kato suffered a spin at the final corner as he looked to improve on his final effort.

Nobody could find an improvement overall, and it left Yamakoshi on pole for the first time in his F3 career.

Ugochukwu wound up P2, 0.030s ahead of Taponen in third. Stromsted narrowly beat out teammate Freddie Slater, with the TRIDENTs fourth and fifth.

Alessandro Giusti ended up P6 ahead of Kato, Le, Jin Nakamura, who was one of the few to improve on their final laps, and Pedro Clerot.

P11 was Ernesto Rivera, leaving James Wharton in 12th and set to start the Sprint Race on reverse grid pole.

The FIA Formula 3 Sprint is scheduled to get underway at 10:05 local time on Saturday.