QUALIFYING: Pin grabs double pole positions in Qatar ahead of Weug and Pulling

Mercedes-backed Doriane Pin secured double pole in Qualifying to give her title hopes an added boost in Qatar, meaning she will start first in both races across the penultimate 2024 F1 ACADEMY weekend.

Alongside her on both front rows will be her PREMA Racing teammate, Ferrari's Maya Weug, with Alpine's Abbi Pulling having to settle for third across the two events as she chases down the Drivers’ title.

It is a dream start to the weekend for Pin, who will try her best to keep the title fight alive as long as she can across the four remaining rounds in Lusail and next weekend in Abu Dhabi.

After a delayed start to the session due to barrier repairs from an earlier event, Qualifying got underway with just 23 minutes available to try and put themselves on pole. There were lots of clean laps early on, with track evolution playing a big part during this Qualifying session.

Pin, who was quickest in both Free Practice sessions on Friday, set the first representative time of the session to go top of the timesheets with a 1:55.998. However, it didn’t take long for Weug to beat that with a 1:55.779, with the two PREMA teammates going back and forth with the fastest times.

As Pin found herself quickest once again, Standings’ leader Pulling tried to add to her tally of seven pole positions this season. It was a frustrating start to the session for the Briton, as the Rodin Motorsport driver found herself caught up in traffic early on.

She boxed for a tyre pressure bleed, before heading back out and giving it her all. Although she was able to pick up the slipstream from Williams’ Lia Block on the start-finish straight, it wasn’t enough and Pulling was forced to settle for third, sixth tenths off Pin.

Several drivers found themselves testing the limits of the circuit layout, with the likes of Haas’ Chloe Chambers driving through the gravel traps, Bianca Bustamante losing the rear of her McLaren into Turns 13 and 14 and Block experiencing a spin throughout the session.

However, in the end it was Pin who finished on top as she set a blistering final lap of 1:55.267, going purple in the first sector and improving on her own best time by 0.042s to place her on provisional pole for both races.

Weug and Pulling gave it their best during the last few moments of Qualifying, but couldn't challenge Pin. Weug will line up second for both races, 0.206s of the Mercedes driver's fastest effort and 0.192s adrift on her second-fastest attempt. Meanwhile, Pulling missed out on pole to Pin by 0.270s for Race 1 and by over six tenths for Sunday’s showdown.

Across the rest of the field, it was another solid result for Block in her Williams as she will start alongside Pulling on the second row later today and will be hunting down her first F1 ACADEMY podium in the desert.

Another star of Qualifying was Wild Card Alisha Palmowski, who will be lining up sixth for Race 1 and fourth for tomorrow’s event. The 18-year-old Brit said she was targeting a podium after finishing third in the second and final Practice session around Lusail, and will hope that she can make up positions across the race.

Hamda Al Qubaisi for Red Bull Racing will start fifth for Race 1, with Palmowski sixth and Nerea Martí seventh in her Tommy Hilfiger machine. Bustamante will line up in eighth for McLaren, with Puma’s Aurelia Nobels and American Express driver Jessica Edgar rounding up the top 10 for this evening’s race.

For Race 2, Hamda Al Qubaisi secured herself another top-five result, with Martí in sixth, Bustamante in seventh, Block eighth and Carrie Schreiner for Kick Sauber making her way onto the fifth row of the grid. The German will find herself starting next to the ART Grand Prix car of Nobels who qualified 10th.

WHAT'S NEXT?

The field won't have long to wait to get back on track, with F1 ACADEMY's first night race taking place tonight at 23:05 local time (GMT+3)