F3: Camara earns fifth pole by 0.008s over Boya to take step towards 2025 crown

Rafael Camara earned his fifth and arguably most important pole position of the season for TRIDENT in Budapest, laying down a 1:35.510 to take the top spot with his very last attempt.

He wound up shading Campos Racing’s Mari Boya by just 0.008s after the Aston Martin Development Driver had held provisional pole for the majority of the session.

Camara’s afternoon didn’t start as planned, as he lost his first attempt for exceeding track limits at Turn 4.

With track position vital around the Hungaroring, Campos opted to run their drivers in the gap after everyone else had returned to the pit lane following their first laps of the day. It looked to pay off as Boya leapt to the top at the first time of asking.

Track evolution was massive throughout the session, and P1 changed hands multiple times over, with seven different drivers holding P1 at various stages of the session.

However, with one final attempt left, Tuukka Taponen improved from outside the top 20 to go fastest of all before Camara delivered a final lap of his own to take away pole position.

Boya followed the Scuderia Ferrari Driver Academy member across the line but could only go to second.

Nikola Tsolov entered the Budapest round as Camara’s closest rival in the Championship, but wound up finishing in 21st place at the chequered flag.

For an in-depth report of the FIA Formula 3 Qualifying session from the Hungaroring, head to the official website here.