Robert Wickens has secured pole position for the final race of the Formula 2 season at the Circuit de Catalunya.
Rain fell a little over half an hour before qualifying began and while the track had dried by the time the cars left the pitlane, the surface still yielded increasing levels of grip as the session wore on.
Mikhail Aleshin was immediately in the groove and set the early pace, remaining at the top of the timesheets for much of the running and becoming the first man to dip into the 1m38s bracket.
Series champion and hometown favorite Andy Soucek then turned in a quick lap to take provisional pole position but was soon displaced by Wickens, who took his second pole of the weekend with a lap of 1m38.096s. By maintaining second place, Soucek ensured that tomorrow's race will feature an identical front row to this afternoon's race one.
Philipp Eng will head the second row where he will be joined by Nicola de Marco, while Aleshin could only manage the seventh-quickest time as his rivals turned in fast laps in the dying moments.
Pos Driver Time Gap
1. Robert Wickens 1m38.096s
2. Andy Soucek 1m38.163s + 0.067s
3. Philipp Eng 1m38.201s + 0.105s
4. Nicola de Marco 1m38.319s + 0.223s
5. Tobias Hegewald 1m38.343s + 0.247s
6. Kazim Vasiliauskas 1m38.414s + 0.318s
7. Mikhail Aleshin 1m38.470s + 0.374s
8. Tristan Vautier 1m38.488s + 0.392s
9. Armaan Ebrahim 1m38.526s + 0.430s
10. Julien Jousse 1m38.607s + 0.511s
11. Jason Moore 1m38.624s + 0.528s
12. Jolyon Palmer 1m38.810s + 0.714s
13. Mirko Bortolotti 1m38.840s + 0.744s
14. Milos Pavlovic 1m38.888s + 0.792s
15. Natacha Gachnang 1m38.916s + 0.820s
16. Tom Gladdis 1m39.012s + 0.916s
17. Alex Brundle 1m39.126s + 1.030s
18. Jack Clarke 1m39.310s + 1.214s
19. Henri Karjalainen 1m39.348s + 1.252s
20. Sebastian Hohenthal 1m39.803s + 1.707s
21. Jens Hoing 1m40.322s + 2.226s
22. German Sanchez 1m40.464s + 2.368s
23. Ollie Hancock 1m40.544s + 2.448s
24. Pietro Gandolfi 1m41.765s + 3.669s