Photo: Roberto Piccinini
Martin Kodric claimed pole position for the final race of the Formula Renault 2.0 Alps season as title contenders Jack Aitken and Jake Hughes languished down the order but the former crucially ahead.
Two red flags, the second bringing an early end to the session, prevented the British Koiranen pairing from setting competitive lap times.
Hughes, who leads Aitken by five points, ended up 19th with his team-mate also down the order in 10th.
But with the top 10 filled mostly by wildcard drivers ineligible to score points, if positions remained the same in the race, Aitken would be on course for 15 points as the third highest Alps driver while Hughes would only get two for ninth place.
Kodric, chasing his first win FR2.0, was over half a second quicker than Matevos Isaakyan, whose title chances ended in a collision in race one that also earned him a four-place grid penalty for race two.
Guesting Eurocup title contenders Ben Barnicoat and Anthoine Hubert were third and fourth fastest ahead of Max Defourny and Thiago Vivacqua.
Simon Gachet was seventh ahead of the SMP F4 graduate pairing of Alexey Korneev and Nikita Troitskiy.
Should Aitken remain third of the Alps points-scorers in the race – and he would need to catch Isaakyan or Vivacqua to improve upon that – Hughes must climb from ninth place to fourth among the eligible pack to win the title.
Qualifying results
| Pos | Driver | Team | Time | Gap | Laps |
| 1 | Martin Kodric | Fortec Motorsports | 1:52.191 | 6 | |
| 2 | Matevos Isaakyan | JD Motorsport | 1:52.752 | 0.561 | 7 |
| 3 | Ben Barnicoat | Fortec Motorsports | 1:52.945 | 0.754 | 6 |
| 4 | Anthoine Hubert | Tech 1 Racing | 1:53.095 | 0.904 | 6 |
| 5 | Max Defourny | Koiranen GP | 1:53.151 | 0.960 | 6 |
| 6 | Thiago Vivacqua | JD Motorsport | 1:53.193 | 1.002 | 7 |
| 7 | Simon Gachet | Tech 1 Racing | 1:54.164 | 1.973 | 6 |
| 8 | Alexey Korneev | JD Motorsport | 1:54.390 | 2.199 | 6 |
| 9 | Nikita Troitskiy | GSK Grand Prix | 1:54.502 | 2.311 | 6 |
| 10 | Jack Aitken | Koiranen GP | 1:54.514 | 2.323 | 6 |
| 11 | Amaury Richard | ARTA Engineering | 1:54.535 | 2.344 | 6 |
| 12 | James Allen | ARTA Engineering | 1:54.602 | 2.411 | 6 |
| 13 | Hugo de Sadeleer | Tech 1 Racing | 1:54.694 | 2.503 | 6 |
| 14 | Jehan Daruvala | Fortec Motorsports | 1:54.864 | 2.673 | 7 |
| 15 | Matteo Ferrer | Cram Motorsport | 1:54.931 | 2.740 | 6 |
| 16 | Danylo Pronenko | BVM Racing | 1:55.231 | 3.040 | 7 |
| 17 | Bruno Baptista | Koiranen GP | 1:55.357 | 3.166 | 5 |
| 18 | Daniele Cazzaniga | GSK Grand Prix | 1:55.522 | 3.331 | 7 |
| 19 | Jake Hughes | Koiranen GP | 1:55.695 | 3.504 | 5 |
| 20 | Vasiliy Romanov | Cram Motorsport | 1:56.632 | 4.441 | 6 |
| 21 | Riccardo Cazzaniga | GSK Grand Prix | 1:57.022 | 4.831 | 7 |
| 22 | TJ Fischer | Cram Motorsport | 1:57.513 | 5.322 | 7 |
| 23 | Stefan Riener | Fortec Motorsports | 2:16.827 | 24.636 | 1 |