In an action-packed FIA Formula 3 European Championship qualifying at the 3.629 kilometres long Nürburgring sprint circuit, Robert Shvartzman (PREMA Theodore Racing, 1m20.637s) came out on top and claimed his second pole position in the FIA Formula 3 European Championship as the reigning European Champion Lando Norris looked on. The best-placed German Mick Schumacher (PREMA Theodore Racing, 1m20.684s) was classified second behind the Russian rookie with the current FIA Formula 3 European Championship points’ leader Daniel Ticktum (Motopark, 1m20.764s) following in third place. His compatriot Enaam Ahmed (Hitech Bullfrog GP, 1m20.890s) ended up fourth to complete the second row of the grid.

In cool temperatures, the young drivers from the FIA Formula 3 European Championship took on the first qualifying session of the weekend at the foot of the Nürburg castle. On his final flying lap, Robert Shvartzman managed to post his fastest lap time that saw him end up ahead of his teammate Mick Schumacher. The German, who completed a few demonstration laps with a Mercedes-AMG race taxi a few hours earlier, secured second place, 0.047 seconds down on Shvartzman.

With three minutes remaining, Alex Palou (Hitech Bullfrog GP, 1m21.008s) still ranked in third place.In the final 120 seconds, however, Daniel Ticktum, Enaam Ahmed, Ralf Aron (PREMA Theodore Racing, 1m20.938s) and Jüri Vips (Motopark, 1m20.977s) all moved up ahead of the Spaniard, who saw himself demoted to seventh place. Marcus Armstrong (PREMA Theodore Racing, 1m21.024s), Jehan Daruvala (Carlin, 1m21.040s) and Marino Sato (Motopark, 1m21.106s) rounded out the top ten. Pace-setter Shvartzman and tenth-placed Sato were separated by only 0.469 seconds, so not even half a second apart. In total, the times of the first 20 drivers were within one second.

Robert Shvartzman (PREMA Theodore Racing): “Of course, pole position is nice, but it is only part of the job. Tomorrow, we have the race in which the points are at stake. Therefore, we now have to keep on working like this and keep concentration up. My team has done a great job for qualifying, because my car handled really well. I didn’t think we would be that fast and I am even happier because of this. In the past races, we were having some issues and we made mistakes as well, but now, I hope that we can keep on going like this until the end of the year.”