Adrian Quaife-Hobbs takes maiden Auto GP World Series pole 09.03.2012: It was Adrian Quaife-Hobbs who clinched the first pole position of the Auto GP World

It was Adrian Quaife-Hobbs who clinched the first pole position of the Auto GP World Series. On the Monza track the british young gun emerged as the quickest after an hard-fought Qualifying: after he managed to stay among the top-runners for the whole session, the SuperNova driver got his perfect lap with just 6’ to go, posting a 1’36”603 that nobody could match.


Sergey Sirotkin tried his best to pip Quaife-Hobbs until the very last lap, but his final laptime was just 0.04 shy of pole, putting him on first row besides Adrian.


Second row for Sergio Campana, just one tenth adrift, and Pål Varhaug: the Norwegian driver and the Virtuosi UK staff kept the improving momentum they had already showed in FP2 and so Pål stopped the clocks on a 1’36”941 that allowed him to keep Chris Van der Drift at bay.


After using the first two sessions to get acquainted with the car, the Kiwi driver used all his talent and experience to bring the Manor MP Motorsport car in fifth place, sharing third row with sixth placed Victor Guerin, with the #11 SuperNova entry.


Italian Antonio Spavone confirmed his improved feeling with both the car and the track with a 1’37”553 that gave him P8 ahead of Facundo Ragalia, again the quickest among the Campos Racing drivers. Closing the top ten were Giacomo Ricci and Daniel de Jong.
 


Adrian Quaife-Hobbs: “Getting pole-position is always a great feeling, especially when you work so hard with the team in order to get what you’re aiming for.


Since the morning we really worked on the tiniest details to make the car as performing as possible, and looking at how much we improved from the first practice, I’d say that it worked quite well. I still had a little gearbox glitch that wasn’t helping me at all with the upshifts, but we have the time to fix it and get a perfect car for tomorrow’s race”.
 

Monza, Qualifying

 
1     Adrian QUAIFE-HOBBS     Super Nova International         1:36.603
2     Sergey SIROTKIN            Euronova Racing                    1:36.644
3     Sergio CAMPANA             MLR 71                                1:36.748
4     Pal VARHAUG                 Virtuosi UK                            1:36.941
5     Chris VAN DER DRIFT      Manor MP Motorsport              1:37.286
6     Victor GUERIN                Super Nova International          1:37.349
7     Antonio SPAVONE           Euronova Racing                     1:37.553
8     Facundo REGALIA           Campos Racing                       1:37.581
9     Giacomo RICCI               Zele Racing                           1:37.766
10    Daniel DE JONG             Manor MP Motorsport              1:37.862
11    Adderly FONG                Ombra Racing                        1:38.076
12    Giuseppe CIPRIANI         Campos Racing                      1:38.132
13    Max SNEGIREV               Campos Racing                     1:38.699
14    Matteo BERETTA            Virtuosi UK                            1:39.271
15    Michele LA ROSA            MLR 71                                1:39.721
16    Giancarlo SERENELLI       Ombra Racing                        1:39.805
 

 
Filippo Zanier, Auto GP photo