Gasly Takes His Second Pole Of The Season

The return to Bahrain has not seen the return of dominance from Stoffel Vandoorne. Although in the earlier stages of the session it looked to be in the bag for the Belgium driver, it was Frenchman Pierre Gasly that topped the time sheets, taking pole position for the feature race tomorrow. Alex Rossi, who looked to be on top of things from his pace in free practice, made a tactical mistake, trying to get some clear air on track. It sees him starting ninth fortomorrow's race. De Jong is back in GP2 after his crash during the Belgium Grand Prix. He returns to his seat in Trident. However, his return was not as impressive as he would have probably hoped, qualifying twenty-first for the race tomorrow. It looked as though qualifying could have taken place in wet conditions as grey clouds lingered over the track, but the rain held off as the twenty-four cars took to the track. It was King who set the early pace in his Racing Engineering car with a timesheet-topping 1:40.217. But new world champion Vandoorne seemed to not be content with anything but pole. When the cars took back to the pits after a few timed runs Vandoorne was top with a time just dipping under the 1:40s. Rossi tried a reverse strategy, not taking to the track until all of the other runners had completed their laps. But the tactic to get some clean track time didn't appear to help as Rossi set his first lap times in at P16, only managing to improve to P5 before everyone else returned to the track. Things don't look the best for the American as he starts P9 tomorrow with a lot to fight through to get to the front of the field. If he is trying to prove something to the F1 community today has not been helped by the fact his attempt at a different strategy has backfired. But it was Gasly who took pole position for tomorrow's feature race, 0.040 up on championship winner Vandoorne. Not a lot changed in the field as the last runs were complete. Marciello finished the top three, with Lynn, King, Nato, Evans, Matsushita, Rossi and Pic completed the top ten. Racing starts at 12:25 GMT tomorrow where we shall see how long Gasly can keep Vandoorne behind or if anyone else can come forward to make a challenge on the front runner, unlike last time out on the Bahrain circuit. (Image: www.gp2series.com)

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