Armaan takes pole position at Shanghai

In a reduced qualifying session that lasted 30 minutes instead of the regular six sessions — owing to time constraint following F1’s Friday practice — Armaan best two laps which were used to determine the grid for Race 1 and 2 of the round were one-hundredth of a second apart. In normal circumstances, there are two qualifying sessions.

With a best of two minutes 12.116s — his second fastest lap of the session that earned him pole in Race 2 — Armaan’s effort was significant for two reasons.

First it was his maiden pole in the championship and secondly more than five drivers including Bahrain’s Salman Khalifa and Hamed Al Fardan — the Championship leaders — have knowledge of the Shanghai track as have all driven in the FBMW last year. With two podium finishes from the six rounds so far, Armaan is currently fifth in the standings.