The morning free practice session was run on a wet track and a fast Jak Crawford (Van Amersfoort Racing) set the best time in 2:01.472, followed by the ever rapid championship leader Gabriele Minì (Prema Powerteam), while third was his teammate, the Russian Kirill Smal, whose strong progress continued. Joshua Duerksen (BWT Muecke Motorsport) also did well in fourth in 2:01.651, while fifth and sixth are respectively Francesco Pizzi (Van Amersfoort Racing) with a 2:02.333 and Dino Beganovic (Prema Powerteam) in 2:02.624.

In the second session the dry track saw the drivers’ performances fall in line with their championship positions, so there were three Italians in the first three positions, in the shape of Minì, Francesco Pizzi (Van Amersfoort Racing) and Andrea Rosso (Cram Motorsport) who finished Free Practice 2 with times of 1:48.228, 1:48.396 and 1:48.402.

In fourth was Jonny Edgar, winner of this year’s German F4 championship, but who has not been able to participate in enough rounds of the packed Italian championship to have much effect. Fifth and still among the fastest was Smal, while sixth, 608 thousandths of a second off the lead, was Joshua Duerksen (BWT Muecke Motorsport).

Rain is not expected tomorrow, so it seems that the defining forces on the field will be those seen in session 2, but the track will certainly be more rubbered in and the conditions in qualifying, which starts at 10.45 local time, could throw some surprises.