F1 Academy: Pin wins both poles in Saudi Arabia

Breaking clear on her second attempt, Pin dropped the benchmark down to within the 2m04.599s. Pulling set on closing the gap down to three tenths as her Rodin Motorsport teammate Jessica Edgar filtered through in third.

Campos Racing’s trio opted to play the waiting game, holding off their outlaps until 18 minutes to go. It seemed to pay off as Nerea Martí slotted inside the top three on her second effort.

Out front, Pin improved her efforts once last time on 2m03.472, extending her advantage to over a second. After failing foul of track limits on her previous attempts, Weug managed to get a clean lap on the board, elevating her to second.

Reclaiming the P2 spot momentarily, Pulling leapt ahead of Weug before the PREMA Racing driver demoted her back to third inside the final five minutes. With only two final attempts at a flying lap remaining, Pulling clawed to within 0.785s of Pin’s best effort, but couldn’t dethrone the Mercedes driver.

Martí secured fourth for Race 1 and will be lining up ahead of McLaren’s Bianca Bustamante. Lola Lovinfosse claimed the sixth-fastest time ahead of Lia Block, Chloe Chambers, Aurelia Nobels and Jessica Edgar, who completes the top 10.

For Race 2, it’ll be a second row start for Lovinfosse going from fourth ahead of Martí. Haas driver Chambers will go from sixth ahead of Aston Martin’s Tina Hausmann, Nobels, Edgar and Bustamante.

Lights go out for Race 1 at 15m10 local time on Friday, followed by Race 2 on Saturday at 15m05 local time.

Race 1 Qualifying