F2: Alpine junior Doohan overcomes late Vips charge to secure second championship pole

The drivers put it all on the line for the final few minutes of Formula 2 Qualifying, but it was Virtuosi Racing’s Jack Doohan who mastered the one-lap pace to snatch pole at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.

It proved to be no ease feat for the Alpine Academy driver, as Red Bull junior Juri Vips jumped back in from his Formula 1 weekend debut in FP1 to storm his way from P21 to second in the closing moments.

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Meanwhile, ART Grand Prix and Mercedes junior driver Frederick Vesti put in his best-ever F2 Qualifying performance to take third.

Doohan was one of four drivers who adopted the alternative strategy to run in the middle of Qualifying, and his time of 1m 28.612s put him well ahead of the rest of the field.

Having abandoned his previous attempts, it was all-or-nothing for Vips at the chequered flag. However, the Estonian driver couldn’t quite manage to overturn Doohan’s advantage – missing out by just over two thousandths of a second.

Interestingly, the top seven drivers are all affiliated to F1 teams. After leading much of the early session, Jehan Daruvala eventually had to settle for fourth. Williams protege Logan Sargeant narrowly beat Ayumu Iwasa by just 0.010s, while Theo Pourchaire, Jake Hughes, Calan Williams and Felipe Drugovich completed the top 10.

Formula 2’s Sprint Race is scheduled to get underway on Saturday at 1740 local time.

For more on F2, visit the official series website.