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Chiappe on F4-S pole

Chris Davies on 20th May 2018

Frenchman Tom Chiappe lined up on pole position for the second of the UIM F4 Trophy races at the Grand Prix of Portugal in the Algarve.

The Emirates Racing Team driver carded a best lap of 54.32 seconds late on to confirm his position. Team Abu Dhabi’s Mohammed Al-Mehairbi lined up in fourth behind Quentin Dailly and race one winner Pedro Fortuna.

Dailly made the first move in the qualifying session with a lap of 55.17sec, only for Chiappe to move to the top of the rankings with a 54.72.

Dailly redressed the balance with a 54.50, while Al-Mehairbi climbed to fourth behind Fortuna and then moved up to third with a lap of 55.08sec as thunder rattled through the skies overhead and dark clouds gathered.

A lap of 54.73sec enabled Fortuna to regain third with less than five minutes remaining and Chiappe managed to snatch pole with a late tour of 54.32sec to set up an intriguing race showdown.

British F4 racer Sam Whittle changed the set-up of his boat and qualified in eighth as a result.

Free practice and the remainder of the weekend’s F4 timetable were brought forward to precede the last of the official F1 practice sessions because of low tide conditions.

Chiappe was the quickest in the warm-up with a lap of 54.17sec.

Al-Mehairbi ran for eight laps and carded the second quickest circuit of 54.67sec. All 10 boats took to the water for the first time over race weekend but the session ended with a yellow flag after Ian Gonsalves inverted his Maverick F1 Racing-run Moore.

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