In what promised to be a closely contested session, not many people had Leonardo Fornaroli as their favorite to claim pole. However, the 18-year-old showed his talent by leading the pack throughout the final third of qualifying and taking home his maiden pole position in FIA Formula 3. Currently in his rookie season, the Trident driver has already claimed two podium finishes and currently sits ninth in the driver’s standings, and today’s performance shows just how fast he can be. Feeder Series spoke to the Italian after his pole-winning qualifying efforts.

By Daniele Spadi

Fornaroli became the fifth different driver this season to achieve pole position with a phenomenal lap in the final minutes of qualifying. The Italian youngster will therefore line up on the front row in Sunday’s Feature Race together with his teammate Ollie Goethe, who will be starting alongside him.

“I’m very happy! Silverstone is a track that I love, and to take my first pole position here is special for me,” he said. “Today I felt very comfortable with the car and with the track, so thanks to Trident for the mega job they did.”

Fornaroli clinched his maiden pole position thanks to a fantastic performance which saw him set the fastest time during the middle part of the session before one-upping himself in his final run of the day, setting a 1:45.520 and beating his Trident teammate Goethe by a little over a tenth.

The Italian team looked to be the strongest of the bunch in qualifying. Not only did the Campos duo of Pepe Martí and Christian Mansell trail Fornaroli by more than three-tenths, but Gabriel Bortoleto was only 0.037s off from making it a Trident 1-2-3 in qualifying.

A season of ups and downs

Fresh off his 2022 FRECA campaign in which he took home the rookies’ title, Fornaroli had a solid start, finishing in the points in five of the opening seven races, including two sprint race podiums in Monaco and Barcelona. Despite only taking home one point in the following three races, the 18-year-old proved today that he has plenty of pace in the car both over one lap and a race’s distance.

“I think the key points for this weekend’s qualifying was the preparation on the simulator. We did a mega job with my engineer and also with my teammates,” he said when asked about what clicked here in Silverstone. “In free practice, I was already feeling comfortable with everything.”

Fornaroli handled the session perfectly, starting on an older set of tyres compared to his rivals before pushing with new rubber and showing everyone his true pace. 

“[At the start] everyone had new tyres in front of me, and I was still P6 or P7 which was very good,” Fornaroli told Feeder Series. “We put the first set of new tyres, I did quite a clean lap and I was already P1 then. [With every lap] with the second set I was still P1, so I was very confident at that point.”

Time to race

Though the 18-year-old started his weekend in the best way possible, he knows there’s still a lot of work to do, and with rain scheduled to hit the track for the Sprint Race, anything can happen. 

“Tomorrow, there is a high chance of rain, and we are starting back in P12. The main goal will be just to score as many points as possible, but without doing any stupid mistakes and without taking too many risks.”

On Sunday, however, the Italian will start ahead of everyone else and try to take home his maiden win in FIA Formula 3. 

“I think slipstream here is quite important if you have the right gap to the car in front, so you can take the good tow in the straights without any dirty air in the fast corners. On the race, I think it will be tricky because I think the cars will be very close, so the dirty air will be high, [and] tyre management [will] also be very important for Sunday with this effect.”

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency