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Campos Racing’s Nikola Tsolov delivered the benchmark performance in morning Free Practice at Spa-Francorchamps, setting a 1:58.927 to finish at the top of the timesheets.
The Championship leader was 0.199 seconds clear of Rodin Motorsport’s Martinius Stenshorne, while Van Amersfoort Racing’s Nico Varrone completed the top three despite ending the session in the barriers. The result gives Tsolov further momentum before qualifying, with the full Formula 2 Spa-Francorchamps session schedule available ahead of the weekend’s remaining running.
Rafael Câmara initially set the pace with a 2:00.035, but that lap was quickly eclipsed by John Bennett and Dino Beganovic. Roman Bilinski then moved to the front with a 2:00.015 for DAMS Lucas Oil.
Bilinski remained quickest after the second sequence of laps, lowering the session’s reference to 1:59.261. That was enough to put him 0.278 seconds ahead of Bennett at the time, before the leading group reshuffled as drivers completed their later runs.
Tsolov was among seven drivers to leave the pitlane later than the rest. The Campos driver immediately made that timing count, producing the session’s fastest lap and moving Stenshorne into second place.
With fewer than 10 minutes remaining, the entire field returned to the circuit for its final attempts. Alexander Dunne was shown the black-and-white flag after all four of his fastest laps were deleted for track-limit infringements.
Dunne was on another flying lap when the red flags appeared. Varrone had run through the gravel and hit the barrier at Turn 14, bringing the session to an early conclusion. With no restart possible, Tsolov retained first place.
Bilinski finished fourth, ahead of Noel León, Kush Maini and Bennett. Câmara ended the session eighth, just in front of Laurens van Hoepen and Gabriele Minì.
The drivers will now debrief with their teams before returning to the track for qualifying at 15:55 local time. With the final laps curtailed, the order leaves Tsolov, Stenshorne and Varrone as the key names at the front heading into the next session.
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