AutoGP: Pommer takes Monza pole

Markus Pommer secured an impressive second consecutive pole position for the seventh round of the 2014 Auto GP season after a tense qualifying battle with series debutant Christof von Grunigen.

With light raining falling on the track throughout the 10-minute session, Pommer and von Grunigen swapped fastest times in what became their own private battle for pole. The German won out by just over three tenths of a second to banish technical problems in the earlier practice session.

Starting on the second row is Eurotech driver Kevin Giovesi who just shaded Super Nova's Michela Cerruti, equalling her performance at the last round in Hungary to start fourth again after an assured performance. Tamas Pal Kiss starts in fifth position and is still playing catch up after a broken damper hampered his second free practice session earlier today. The Zele driver shares the third row with Andrea Roda.

In the first segment of qualifying that determined the top 10, Francesco Dracone, Loris Spinelli and Samin Gomez all narrowly missed out on making the shoot-out.

Spinelli was the only driver to encounter significant drama when he had a high-speed trip through the gravel at Parabolica early in the session.