Alexander Dunne and Martinius Stenshorne clinched the pole positions for the two main races of the 12th round of the 2026 Formula 2 season. The qualifying sessions held on Thursday morning (the 24th) at the street circuit set up in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, saw the Rodin Motorsport drivers rise to the top, with the Irishman starting from the front in Friday’s feature race and the Norwegian leading the pack in Saturday’s race.
The opening session of the weekend encountered a delay and culminated in Dunne taking pole, his best lap time of 1m55.383s for Rodin Motorsport. Stenshorne, also with Rodin, starts second after being edged by his teammate by 0.033 seconds. Noel León, of Campos Racing, starts third, followed by Kush Maini in fourth for ART Grand Prix. Rafael Câmara completes the top five with Invicta Racing.
Mari Boya placed Prema sixth on the grid for the first feature race, while Sebastian Montoya, also with Prema, finished seventh. Dino Beganovic of DAMS secured eighth, with Laurens van Hoepen of Trident ninth. Nikola Tsolov, the championship leader, starts tenth with Campos Racing and will head the lone Sprint of the weekend. Emmo Fittipaldi, with AIX Racing, finished twentieth.
In the second qualifying session, which decided Saturday’s race, Stenshorne took pole with a time of 1:53.728, beating Dunne, his Rodin teammate, by 0.445 seconds. Câmara, who led much of the session, ended up third with Invicta, ahead of Boya in fourth for Prema. The top five was completed by Maini, driving a car prepared by ART Grand Prix.
León, in a Campos Racing machine, will line up sixth, while Van Hoepen is seventh with Trident. Tsolov, León’s teammate, will start eighth on Saturday, while Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak of ART Grand Prix will begin ninth. Montoya, with Prema, completes the top ten. Emmo Fittipaldi again starts from 20th with AIX Racing.
After the qualifying sessions, the Formula 2 Sprint will get underway at 1:15 PM on Friday, the day that also features Main Race 1 at 7:15. Main Race 2 is scheduled to start at 4:00.
