Points leader Luke Browning set the benchmark time in the opening F4 British Championship certified by FIA – powered by Ford EcoBoost practice session of the weekend at Knockhill.

The Fortec Motorsport racer completed the most mileage of any driver in the field across the 40-minute session, clocking a best time of 49.462 around the 1.26-mile Fife circuit to head up the timesheets, a clear tenth of a second ahead of nearest championship rival Zak O’Sullivan (Carlin).

O’Sullivan improved on his penultimate lap to the runner-up spot, pushing Browning’s Fortec team mate Roberto Faria into third, a further 0.028s back.

Casper Stevenson (Argenti), James Hedley (JHR) and Alex Connor (Arden) all set personal best times on their final flying efforts to move into fourth, fifth and sixth respectively, the entire top six covered by a mere 0.3s, and with at least one driver from each team.

Carlin’s Christian Mansell was the highest-placed Rookie Cup entry in seventh, with Oulton Park podium finisher Roman Bilinski eighth in the second of Arden’s Red Arrows.

The returning Rafael Villagomez (Fortec) was ninth to complete a top-ten hat-trick for Richard Dutton’s outfit, with Abbi Pulling (JHR) rounding out the ten quickest runners.

Nico Pino was 11th for Argenti ahead of Frederick Lubin (Arden), who carries a five-place grid penalty over from Oulton Park into the weekend.

Matias Zagazeta (Carlin) and Reema Juffali (Argenti) were split by just 0.004 seconds in 13th and 14th, the field completed by Nathanael Hodgkiss, who caused the only red flag of the session after stopping out on circuit with a mechanical problem in the opening exchanges.

The weekend continues with Free Practice 2 at 14:20 (BST).

Session Result – Free Practice 1