F2: Maloney beats rivals Hadjar and Aron to take pole in Monza

Rodin Motorsport’s Zane Maloney produced a stunning last lap effort in qualifying to beat his title rivals Isack Hadjar and Paul Aron to pole position at Monza, the first of Formula 2 career.

In a red flag-affected session, the majority of the field had just one push lap at the end of qualifying to get a time on the board and it was Campos Racing’s Hadjar that went to provisional pole on a 1m 32.249s.

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However, Maloney, who had been fastest in practice, put in a tremendous final two sectors to take top spot with a 1m 32.160s, beating the championship leader by just 0.089s.

Aron will start third for Hitech Pulse-Eight as he looks to get his title challenge back under way.

However, Gabriel Bortoleto, who is second in the standings, will have to do that from the back of the grid after he beached his Invicta Racing car in the gravel at the second Lesmo having not set a representative lap time.

Dennis Hauger was an impressive fourth for MP Motorsport ahead of Alpine Academy driver Victor Martins, who wound up in P5 for ART Grand Prix.

Following them was PREMA Racing’s Andrea Kimi Antonelli while Josep María Martí made it two Red Bull-painted Campos cars in the top-10 by qualifying seventh.

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Antonelli’s team mate, Oliver Bearman, finished eighth fastest, ahead of the second Hitech car of Amaury Cordeel.

Cordeel is set to line up on the front row for the Sprint Race, where Enzo Fittipaldi will start on reverse-grid pole after finishing 10th for Van Amersfoort Racing.

The 21-lap race is set to start at 14:15 local time on Saturday afternoon but until then you can read the full report from the FIA Formula 2 qualifying session at Monza on the official series website.