Jack Doohan Claims Maiden F3 Pole For 2021 Belgian Race Three in Wet Qualifying

Trident’s Jack Doohan overcame the wet conditions of Spa Francorchamps to clinch pole position for 2021 Belgian Race Three, after Trident teammate – Clement Novalak topped Practice.

Difficult weather conditions affected running throughout Practice and Qualifying as F3 cars initially faced damp conditions in Practice, followed by a wet track in Qualifying which began to dry towards the end.

Trident though were the only team to master the elements as Novalak topped Practice whilst Doohan claimed pole position for Sunday’s Belgian Race Three.

Now here is a full roundup of Friday’s F3 action in Belgium across both sessions.

Practice

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Practice began in damp conditions as morning fog slowly but surely cleared with ART GP’s Aleksandr Smolyar setting the initial pace on 2m 06.748 ahead of Jenzer’s Johnathan Hoggard as Smolyar’s teammate – Frederik Vesti found himself third quickest in a slow start as teams adapted to damp conditions.

Ayumu Iwasa and Zdenek Chovanec suffered spins at Campus and Les Combes respectively in a three minute spell, as Jack Doohan went fastest with 2m 06.356 in the 20th minute, only to be displaced by Lorenzo Colombo eight minutes later after the latter went 0.256s quicker.

Track conditions continued to dry up which caused times to fall further but only Clement Novalak and Oliver Rasmussen managed to better Colombo’s time, as Novalak topped the session with 2m 05.330 ahead of Rasmussen and Colombo with Doohan and Jak Crawford rounding out the top five.

Position	Driver	Team	Time
1	Clement Novalak	Trident	2m 05.330
2	Oliver Rasmussen	HWA Racelab	+ 0.495
3	Lorenzo Colombo	Campos	+ 0.770
4	Jack Doohan	Trident	+ 0.927
5	Jak Crawford	Hitech GP	+ 1.029
6	Frederik Vesti	ART GP	+ 1.062
7	Roman Stanek	Hitech GP	+ 1.118
8	Aleksandr Smolyar	ART GP	+ 1.379
9	Olli Caldwell	PREMA	+ 1.451
10	Johnathan Hoggard	Jenzer	+ 1.468
11	Ayumu Iwasa	Hitech GP	+ 1.483
12	Matteo Nannini	HWA Racelab	+ 1.511
13	Dennis Hauger	PREMA	+ 1.588
14	Arthur Leclerc	PREMA	+ 1.614
15	Victor Martins	MP Motorsport	+ 1.732
16	Logan Sargeant	Charouz	+ 1.845
17	Caio Collet	MP Motorsport	+ 1.857
18	Juan Manuel Correa	ART GP	+ 1.911
19	David Schumacher	Trident	+ 2.138
20	Hunter Yeany	Charouz	+ 2.167
21	Calan Williams	Jenzer	+ 2.331
22	Rafael Villagomez	HWA Racelab	+ 2.408
23	Laszlo Toth	Campos	+ 2.418
24	Zdenek Chovanec	Charouz	+ 2.574
25	Tijmen Van Der Helm	MP Motorsport	+ 2.874
26	Jonny Edgar	Carlin	+ 3.002
27	Ido Cohen	Carlin	+ 3.085
28	Amaury Cordeel	Campos	+ 4.163
29	Filip Ugran	Jenzer	No Time Set

Qualifying

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Heavy rain returned during W Series Practice and lingered around for the opening minutes of Qualifying, as Doohan set the initial fastest lap time of 2m 21.953 which would go unbeaten, despite Novalak, Smolyar, Logan Sargeant and Victor Martins rounding out the initial top five after opening fliers were done.

Only Jak Crawford, Ayumu Iwasa and Calan Williams found improvement on their second fliers as Chovanec suffered a brief spin, although track conditions soon began to dry up as all three PREMA cars struggled to break the top ten with Arthur Leclerc eventually fastest in 13th position.

Majority of drivers opted to do quick pit stops and head back out on track, which enabled Martins to leap up to second ahead of Smolyar and Caio Collet as Sargeant displaced Novalak to qualify sixth fastest.

Doohan failed to improve on his first flier for rest of session, yet eventually hung on for his maiden pole position in F3 after Tijmen Van Der Helm’s stoppage at Blanchimont brought out the red flag with a minute left on the clock thus prematurely ending the session.

Doohan’s pole position also saw him cut his title deficit to Dennis Hauger down to 59 points after the Norwegian could only qualify 14th fastest for Sunday’s Race Three.

Lorenzo Colombo meanwhile inherited reverse-pole for Saturday’s Belgian Race One after qualifying 12th with Jak Crawford joining him on the front row.

Position	Driver	Team	Time
1	Jack Doohan	Trident	2m 21.953
2	Victor Martins	MP Motorsport	+ 0.704
3	Aleksandr Smolyar	ART GP	+ 0.769
4	Caio Collett	MP Motorsport	+ 0.783
5	Logan Sargeant	Charouz	+ 0.822
6	Clement Novalak	Trident	+ 0.858
7	Frederik Vesti	ART GP	+ 1.315
8	David Schumacher	Trident	+ 1.800
9	Johnathan Hoggard	Jenzer	+ 1.832
10	Roman Stanek	Hitech GP	+ 1.863
11	Jak Crawford	Hitech GP	+ 2.011
12	Lorenzo Colombo	Campos	+ 2.109
13	Arthur Leclerc	PREMA	+ 2.301
14	Dennis Hauger	PREMA	+ 2.335
15	Matteo Nannini	HWA Racelab	+ 2.435
16	Rafael Villagomez	HWA Racelab	+ 2.750
17	Ayumu Iwasa	Hitech GP	+ 2.895
18	Olli Caldwell	PREMA	+ 3.072
19	Calan Williams	Jenzer	+ 3.124
20	Jonny Edgar	Carlin	+ 3.185
21	Tijmen Van Der Helm	MP Motorsport	+ 3.219
22	Amaury Cordeel	Campos	+ 3.433
23	Oliver Rasmussen	HWA Racelab	+ 3.660
24	Ido Cohen	Carlin	+ 3.943
25	Laszlo Toth	Campos	+ 4.008
26	Hunter Yeany	Charouz	+ 4.116
27	Juan Manuel Correa	ART GP	+ 4.272
28	Zdenek Chovanec	Charouz	+ 4.762
29	Filip Ugran	Jenzer	No Time Set