Qualifying for the opening round of the Italian F4 Championship at the Misano World Circuit has come to an end. Luka Sammalisto, the Finnish driver for US Racing, set the fastest overall time with a 1’35.492 lap, securing pole position for Race 2 and Race 3 at the head of Group A. The fastest driver in the other series was Prema Racing’s Turkish driver Alp Aksoy, who will start from pole position in Race 1 with Group B.
In the first qualifying session, Sammalisto remained at the top from the very first flying laps, setting the fastest overall time on his final attempt. Behind him was Ferrari Driver Academy racer Niccolò Maccagnani of Prema Racing, 0.406 seconds adrift. Third fastest was Edward Robinson of US Racing at 0.418, while fourth place went to Danish driver David Walther of Maffi Racing, also 0.418 behind the leader.
Fifth place went to Oleksandr Savinkov of US Racing at 0.477, followed by Williams Driver Academy driver Oleksandr Bondarev of Prema Racing in sixth at 0.523. Noah Killion of US Racing finished seventh at 0.553 after being among the frontrunners during the middle stages of the session. Eighth was Spain’s Christian Costoya of Prema Racing, a member of the McLaren Driver Development Programme, at 0.604. Completing the top 10 were Bader Al Sulaiti of Jenzer Motorsport and Pedro Lima of Van Amersfoort Racing, respectively 0.654 and 0.699 behind the benchmark time.
In the second session, Alp Aksoy secured pole position for Group B, earning the right to start Race 1 from the front. Just 0.042 seconds behind him was David Cosma-Cristofor of Prema Racing. Third and fourth positions went to the two Mercedes juniors of R-ace GP: Andy Consani at 0.152 and Kenzo Craigie at 0.200.
Fifth fastest was Italian driver Ludovico Busso of US Racing at 0.257, followed by two more teammates who confirmed the strong form of the German squad at the start of the season: Ary Bansal at 0.318 and Arjen Kräling at 0.503.
Oscar Repetto of PHM Racing finished eighth at 0.579, ahead of Chinese driver Ho Kingsley Zheng Kwan of Prema Racing, ninth at 0.998 and the final driver within one second of the session leader. Completing the top 10 in the second qualifying session was Brazilian driver Augustus Toniolo of Trident Motorsport, 1.018 seconds off the pace. The second session was interrupted by a red flag caused by an off-track incident involving Tomika Gender (R-ace GP), with the Hungarian driver consequently penalised by the deletion of his fastest lap time.
The battle for the Female Trophy is also set to be fiercely competitive, with five drivers ready to fight for top honours in Race 1. Leading the group will be PHM Racing’s Emma Felbermayr, starting from the eighth row of the grid. Right behind her will be Rafaela Ferreira, racing for CRAM Motorsport and part of the Visa Cash App Racing Bulls Academy Programme.
Luka Sammalisto: “We have been testing with the team, trying to find the whole package in the right way. We felt really confident for qualifying and absolutely nailed it. I’m really happy about it. I can’t wait to see how the races will go, we’ll see what we can do, but right now it’s looking really good. I know the pace is there, we have been training for this moment. Starting in front, I just need to remain calm, get a good launch off the line, and stay consistent.”
Alp Aksoy: “We got pole in my group, and it’s my first round in the Italian F4, so it’s a good way to start, of course. The fight is on! The team is really strong, and the car is really strong as well. We just need to extract the maximum from our potential.”