Press Releases - F3 Masters Round 1 Pau Quali: Bellamy takes pole as Villeneuve confirms an all Canadian front row

F3 Masters Round 1 Pau Quali: Bellamy takes pole as Villeneuve confirms an all Canadian front row

Samuel Bellamy took a brilliant pole position in the first ever race of the season at Pau with younger compartiot Steve Villeneuve not far behind alongside him on the front row. Bartek Szybki beating Villanova and Glifford respectively to 3rd spot with a couple of stars during the qualifying session

Report:
It was an exciting qualifying session, with only a single lap to determine the starting position, the session got underway with polish youngster Tomek Pasek taking to the track for the first time this season, setting the benchmark for the session, Juca Micieira was up next, comfortably beating the benchmark by over a second but only for Bartek Szybki, one of the favourites to calm him down with a 1:13.823. But it wasn't long til one of the rivals, the Canadian, Samuel Bellamy to put in a 1:13.64, an astonishing first sector to take provisional pole, with the track getting hotter and hotter, the fight for pole just only got started. Petter Solberg deserves a shoutout, not far away from pole and beaten some of the older guys to only be a margin behind Bartek Szybki, decent lap from the Norwegian. A little later on, another set of key rivals Thorin Eichenschild, Cordell Glifford and Steve Villeneuve all had a go in a warmer track with a little bit more grip, Eichenschild was a little bit far off, Glifford just missed out on Szybki's provisional spot by a couple of hunderths but Steve Villeneuve made sure it was a provisional Canadian 1-2 but he couldn't beat his older compartiot, Marc Vilanova who is hailed the next Enriques Moralesgarcia, the Spanish F1 World Champion went on to qualify in a provisional 4th, not much behind Szybki but only thousandths infront of Cordell Glifford the American. Heleia Gerones giving a good reputation for the girls later on with a decent lap and not far off the top guys. We saw a couple of casualties during the 1 lap shootouts, Marc Montane had a scruffy Turn 5 while trying to make it all perfect so he will be one to watch for tomorrow, his fellow Spaniard Angel Holguera who peformed well there last season struggled for pace and will also find himself at the back,while Aussie Cameron Pither who is also down there that time at Turn 7, the touring car expert will be another one to watch but the biggest loser was Karina Sette, the young Brazilian maiden who found herself spinning around at Turn 1 when she clipped too much of the outside kerb but she was able to keep it out of the wall but her whole meeting might be ruined cause of that but her progess isn't the one to keep your eye off from.
Michael Damon Novikov, the highly-rated 22 year old Russian, joined the F3 Masters grid (like many others) and qualified in a provisional 12th place and confirmed himself to be one to watch for the future as he impressed in qualifying, after going through a couple more drivers to set a lap time, Luiz Thomazini, the driver that a couple of people have betted on to take the championship this year was the last one to hit the track, once lost a tenth in sector 1, and was still down in sector 2 despite a purple, losing another tenth in sector 3 was enough for Bellamy to confirm his pole position and what could be a potential race win and an interesting battle for the whole 10 races.

Results:
1 S. Bellamy
01:13.640
2 S. Villeneuve
01:13.760
+00.120 (+0.120)
3 B. Szybki
01:13.823
+00.183 (+0.063)
4 M. Vilanova
01:13.841
+00.201 (+0.018)
5 C. Gifford
01:13.852
+00.213 (+0.012)
6 L. Thomazini
01:13.864
+00.224 (+0.011)
7 P. Solberg
01:13.904
+00.264 (+0.040)
8 H. Geronès
01:13.983
+00.344 (+0.080)
9 T. Eichenschild
01:13.999
+00.360 (+0.016)
10 M. Zaggro
01:14.003
+00.364 (+0.004)
11 A. Nario
01:14.173
+00.533 (+0.169)
12 R. Penninckmeester
01:14.187
+00.547 (+0.014)
13 R. Verschoor
01:14.227
+00.587 (+0.040)
14 A. Reis
01:14.250
+00.610 (+0.023)
15 M. Novikov
01:14.267
+00.627 (+0.017)
16 S. Wallace
01:14.312
+00.672 (+0.045)
17 A. DeCesaris
01:14.313
+00.674 (+0.002)
18 J. Macieira II
01:14.321
+00.681 (+0.007)
19 Z. Austin
01:14.355
+00.715 (+0.034)
20 M. Del Ragno
01:14.433
+00.793 (+0.078)
21 R. Passaniti
01:14.477
+00.837 (+0.044)
22 K. Wirdheim
01:14.527
+00.887 (+0.050)
23 H. Volak Jr.
01:14.622
+00.982 (+0.095)
24 P. Nannini
01:14.633
+00.993 (+0.011)
25 P. Ross
01:14.677
+01.037 (+0.044)
26 S. Suikkanen
01:14.735
+01.096 (+0.059)
27 C. de Saint-Germain
01:14.754
+01.115 (+0.019)
28 D. Lumbreras Jr.
01:14.842
+01.203 (+0.088)
29 B. Reckziegel
01:14.960
+01.320 (+0.117)
30 R. Callaway
01:14.996
+01.356 (+0.036)
31 M. Montane
01:15.004
+01.364 (+0.008)
32 C. Pither
01:15.418
+01.778 (+0.414)
33 T. Müller
01:15.660
+02.021 (+0.243)
34 T. Pasek
01:15.794
+02.154 (+0.133)
35 A. Holguera
01:15.882
+02.243 (+0.089)
36 P. Goldberg III
01:16.769
+03.129 (+0.886)
37 T. Smets
01:17.128
+03.488 (+0.359)
38 M. Mizuhara
01:17.223
+03.583 (+0.095)
39 K. Sette
01:22.073
+08.433 (+4.850)
40 A. Pimentel
01:26.830
+13.190 (+4.757)

See you tomorrow for the Sprint Race guys, I heard tyre management might be crucial for the Sprint Race but defintely the feature Race! Oh and by the way if you guys want to see the spreadsheet, copy and paste (or click) the underlined link below.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jBxrkc3XxXM_Z1ZxfS0QdOP1RAzzb3R1H-3_bVnEQTc/