The collective testing day of the Italian F.4 Championship has come to a close at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola, acting as a prelude to the fifth round of the season, which takes place as part of the ACI Racing Weekend. It was an “extra” day made available to teams and drivers to work on setup ahead of the race weekend, featuring two extended sessions of 1 hour and 55 minutes each, held at 9:00AM and 2:00PM.
In the morning session, Enea Frey set the benchmark time with Jenzer Motorsport, stopping the clock at 1’47.032. However, the time was lowered in the afternoon by Finnish driver Luka Sammalisto, who posted the fastest lap of the day with US Racing in 1’46.428.
Just behind him came no fewer than four of his teammates, confirming the strong form of the Kerpen-based outfit. Kabir Anurag, part of the Alpine Academy, ended up 0.199 seconds off the pace, followed by Gabriel Gomez at 0.286 and Andrija Kostic at 0.344.
Fifth fastest was Oleksandr Bondarev with Prema Racing, representing the Williams Driver Academy. He was 0.417 off the top time and once again finished as the fastest rookie. Right behind him came his teammate from Colombia, Salim Hanna, sixth with the same time of 0.424 also recorded by Maksimilian Popov with Van Amersfoort Racing.
In eighth position, Maxim Rehm from Germany with US Racing was 0.454 behind, followed by championship leader Kean Nakamura-Berta, also with Prema Racing, in ninth at 0.497. Rounding out the top ten was Reno Francot with PHM Racing, 0.523 off the benchmark.
Tomorrow, Friday 1 August, marks the first official day of the ACI Racing Weekend, starting with two 40-minute free practice sessions at 9:00AM and 1:20PM, followed by qualifying in the evening. Q1 will take place from 6:10PM to 6:25PM and Q2 from 6:35PM to 6:50PM. The two sessions will determine the grids for Race 1 and Race 2, while the Race 3 grid will be based on each driver’s second-best lap time.
On Saturday 2 August, Race 1 will start at 11:40AM (30 minutes + 1 lap), with Race 2 scheduled for 6:40AM (30 minutes + 1 lap). The weekend will conclude on Sunday 3 August with Race 3 at 12:00PM (30 minutes + 1 lap).
The first two races will be broadcast live on ACI Sport TV (Sky channel 228 and Tivůsat channel 52), while Race 3 will be aired as a delayed broadcast on Sunday evening. All races will be available via live streaming at live.acisport.it and on the ACI Sport TV Facebook and YouTube channels. English-language commentary will also be available through international broadcasters airing the Italian F.4 Championship, as well as on the official social media channels of the series.