Freddie Slater takes Monza F3 pole as Trident locks out front row

Slater edges De Palo in split qualifying

Freddie Slater claimed his third pole position in four races for Trident at Monza, with teammate Matteo De Palo completing a front-row lockout for Sunday’s Feature Race.

Formula 3 returned after more than a month away at the “Temple of Speed”, where qualifying once again revolved around the precision of slipstream timing. As outlined in our Formula 3 Monza preview, the 30-car field was divided into two groups of 15, with each group given a 10-minute session.

MP Motorsport’s Alessandro Giusti had set the pace in practice ahead of teammates Tuukka Taponen and Mattia Colnaghi. The session also featured a collision between Campos’ Ugo Ugochukwu and De Palo, with Ugochukwu deemed responsible and handed a five-place grid penalty for both races. Meanwhile, Alex Powell replaced Louis Sharp at Prema and entered the weekend sixth in Eurocup-3.

Group One: De Palo delivers at home

The even-numbered drivers formed the first group, but the majority waited before committing to their timed runs. Fionn McLaughlin chose clean air rather than a tow, yet the strategy failed to deliver when he could not improve on his second lap and finished 14th.

The order changed rapidly as drivers completed their final attempts. Kanato Le briefly took control before De Palo found more time and moved to the top. The Italian secured pole for his home race within the group, finishing ahead of Le, Taito Kato, Hiyu Yamakoshi, Fernando Barrichello and Taponen.

Several leading championship contenders struggled for position. Brando Badoer was seventh, Bruno del Pino eighth, Noah Strømsted ninth and Ugochukwu only 10th. With his penalty applied, Ugochukwu faced a start as far back as 24th.

Slater sets the overall benchmark

Group Two produced the decisive lap. Every driver initially completed an installation lap before waiting until the final three minutes to return to the circuit, with Yevan David leading the pack onto the track.

Slater quickly established himself at the front as the timed laps arrived. The Trident driver’s effort was faster than De Palo’s group-leading mark, securing the odd-numbered positions and overall pole. Behind him, Nicola Lacorte, Ernesto Rivera, Giusti, Colnaghi, Pedro Clerot, Gerrard Xie, James Wharton, Maciej Gładysz and David completed the leading group.

Théophile Naël suffered the most damaging session, failing to record a time after an error at Turn One. Slater and Rivera therefore gained a significant advantage heading into the Feature Race.

The top 12 will start: Slater, De Palo, Lacorte, Le, Rivera, Kato, Giusti, Yamakoshi, Colnaghi, Barrichello, Clerot and Taponen.