Phinsys by Argenti’s Aiden Neate set the benchmark time across two ROKiT F4 British Championship certified by FIA practice sessions held in perfect conditions at Oulton Park today (10 June).
A quickest time of 1:20.417 around the 2.2-mile Cheshire circuit proved enough for the Brit to eventually secure top spot, having traded the fastest time with championship leader Alex Dunne (Hitech) and Louis Sharp (Carlin) across the faster afternoon session.
Mercedes-AMG junior Daniel Guinchard was also rapid in the clear conditions, splitting Dunne and Sharp in the final reckoning with the third quickest time, just 0.078 seconds adrift of his Argenti team-mate Neate’s timesheet-topping effort.
That demoted Sharp to fourth, but he remained at the head of a Carlin trio, with FP1 pace-setter Oliver Gray and McLaren protégé Ugo Ugochukwu fifth and sixth respectively.
Joseph Loake was seventh in the leading JHR Developments challenger, and enters the weekend as the only driver on the 2022 grid to have previously won a race in Britain’s FIA Formula 4 series at Oulton Park. His team-mate Georgi Dimitrov was next, and the only driver to set his faster time in the morning’s running.
Eduardo Coseteng (Hitech) was ninth-fastest, the top ten runners completed by Noah Lisle (JHR), both in each individual session and overall. Adam Fitzgerald (Argenti) scored his first top-ten finish at Thruxton last time out, and was again on the fringes of a repeat showing in 11th.
Oliver Stewart completed three Hitech runners in 12th, with Daniel Mavlyutov absent through exams, leading the Virtuosi Racing pairing of Michael Shin and Edward Pearson. Chris Dittmann Racing’s Joel Pearson rounds out the 15-strong field on combined times, but will be ‘one to watch’ after a series of blistering recent performances on race day.
Arguably the most crucial qualifying session of the season due to Oulton Park’s narrow, defensive nature kicks off the competitive action at 10:45 (BST) tomorrow (11 June), with the opening race to follow later that afternoon at 14:55.
Sunday features a double header of action, with the reverse grid contest live on ITV at 13:00, then the finale on ITV4 at 17:45.
