Charlie Wurz storms to pole at Manfeild

Charlie Wurz has secured pole position for Round 3 of the Formula Regional Oceania Championship at Manfeild Circuit Chris Amon.

Wurz set a 1:09.860s to top the timesheets at the end of the 15-minute wet qualifying session, edging out current Indy Pro 2000 champion Louis Foster (1:10.159s) and Australian Ryder Quinn (1:10.179s).

It represents the Austrian’s second pole position for the season, after his feature race pole at Teretonga Park – that led to him holding a 25-point advantage at the top of the championship standings following the 30-lap race.

“I was a bit nervous at the end as the cars were still coming and I was waiting for my engineer to tell me where we were,” Wurz said.

“My last lap, I didn’t really put it together but somehow I think the track was improving a bit. But I have to say that the car was really spot on today and was a real pleasure to drive. We were really fast throughout the session and I still have more time to find so everything looking forward to the race is just positive.”

Despite the session being interrupted after British driver Josh Mason found himself in the tyre barrie, multiple drivers managed to trade times at the top of the timesheets including Foster, Callum Hedge and Liam Sceats.

Quinn kept within striking distance of the frontrunners, with his last lap effort resulting in him displacing American Jacob Abel for third.

Abel pipped Sceats for fifth, with Hedge to start from sixth.

American David Morales lapped seventh fastest, ahead of New Zealander James Penrose in eighth, with Irish driver Adam Fitzgerald and American Ryan Shehan rounding out the top 10.

Billy Frazer, Chloe Chambers, Josh Mason, Lucas Fecury and Bree Morris completed the field.

Race 1 will be a 22-lap affair at 15:13 local time/13:13 AEDT, with inclement weather likely to have an impact on proceedings.

Qualifying Result

1. Charlie Wurz (Austria)
2. Louis Foster (GB)
3. Ryder Quinn (Aus)
4. Jacob Abel (USA)
5. Liam Sceats (NZ)
6. Callum Hedge (NZ)
7. David Morales (USA)
8. James Penrose (NZ)
9. Adam Fitzgerald (Irl)
10. Ryan Shehan (USA)
11. Tom McLennan (Aus)
12. Billy Frazer (NZ)
13. Chloe Chambers (USA)
14. Josh Mason (UK)
15. Lucas Fecury (Bra)
16. Bree Morris (NZ)