Formula E- Rounds 7&8: Barmy Berlin

Formula E arrived in Berlin this weekend for an earlier than usual Tempelhof airport double header. What was served up over the two days of competition was the traditional pure chaos we expect from the championship.

Practice

Day one’s practice sessions were subdued affairs with your standard basic running and initial weekend prep, practice one and practice two were topped by the DS Penske of Stoffel Vandoorne and Maxi Gunther respectively.

However, practice three was not a normal affair due to morning rain in Berlin however the result was pretty normal with the Jaguar of Mitch Evans taking top spot on the time sheets.

Qualifying

Day one’s qualifying took place early on Saturday morning with the result as follows:

Group A’s four qualifiers were Stoffel Vandoorne, Sebastian Buemi, Nick Cassidy and Sergio Sette Camara.

Group B’s qualifiers were Sam Bird, Maxi Gunther, Dan Ticktum and Jake Dennis.

Therefore, the Knockouts were Buemi v Cassidy, Vandoorne v Camara, Ticktum v Gunther and Bird V Dennis.

This became Buemi v Vandoorne and Ticktum V Bird with Buemi beating Bird in the final to take pole.

Day two’s qualifying was a chaotic-wet affair:

Group A’s four qualifiers were Jean Èric Vergne, Pascal Wehrlein, Nico Muller and Jake Dennis.

Group B’s qualifiers were Buemi, Robin Frijns, Mitch Evans and Nick Cassidy.

Therefore, the Knockouts were Muller v Wehrlein, Vergne v Dennis, Buemi v Cassidy and Evans v Frijns.

This became Muller v Vergne and Frjins v Buemi this became surprisingly Muller v Frijns with perennial backmarkers ABT Cupra taking a front row grid lockout.

The Races

Both races were overtake fests with a combined 362 overtakes over both 40 lap races. This was mainly due to the unnatural high energy consuming nature of the Berlin track. This turned the race into a peloton with no one wanting to lead the races until the last few laps.

Race one’s winner was Evans followed by Bird for a Jaguar one two and race two’s winner was Nick Cassidy who is now seen as a championship contender for Envision Racing.

Apart from the winners both races were full of accidents with drivers such as Ticktum and Vandoorne failing to finish race one and drivers such as Andre Lotterer having to pit in race 2 due to large accidents. It also must be said the start of race two was delayed by protestors who were swiftly removed.

Results

Race one

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	km/h	Retirement	Points
1	9	Mitch Evans	Jaguar Racing	43	55’10.391			110.1		25
2	10	Sam Bird	Jaguar Racing	43	55’12.241	1.850	1.850	110.1		18
3	7	Mitch Evans	Maserati Racing	43	55’13.129	2.738	0.888	110.0		15
4	16	Sébastien Buemi	Envision Racing	43	55’13.240	2.849	0.111	110.0		15
5	37	Nick Cassidy	Envision Racing	43	55’15.178	4.787	1.938	110.0		10
6	94	Pascal Wehrlein	Porsche Team	43	55’19.502	9.111	4.324	109.8		8
7	25	Jean-Eric Vergne	DS Penske	43	55’19.582	9.191	0.080	109.8		6
8	36	Andre Lotterer	Andretti Autosport	43	55’19.895	9.504	0.313	109.8		5
9	48	Edoardo Mortara	Maserati Racing	43	55’20.550	10.159	0.655	109.8		2
10	8	Oliver Rowland	Mahindra Racing	43	55’20.699	10.308	0.149	109.8		1
11	11	Lucas di Grassi	Mahindra Racing	43	55’29.840	19.449	9.141	109.5
12	23	Sacha Fenestraz	Nissan e.dams	43	55’31.940	21.549	2.100	109.4
13	17	Norman Nato	Nissan e.dams	43	55’34.952	24.561	3.012	109.3
14	4	Robin Frijns	Team Abt	43	55’36.018	25.627	1.066	109.3
15	51	Nico Müller	Team Abt	43	55’37.971	27.580	1.953	109.2
16	3	Sergio Sette Camara	NIO Formula E Team	43	55’45.238	34.847	7.267	109.0
17	58	René Rast	McLaren	42	56’00.591	1 Lap	1 Lap	106.0
18	27	Jake Dennis	Andretti Autosport	38	56’18.983	5 Laps	4 Laps	95.3
	13	Antonio Felix da Costa	Porsche Team	30	40’27.369	13 Laps	8 Laps		Retirement
	5	Jake Hughes	McLaren	19	24’27.579	24 Laps	11 Laps		Retirement
	1	Stoffel Vandoorne	DS Penske	19	24’27.012	24 Laps			Retirement
	33	Dan Ticktum	NIO Formula E Team	19	24’26.653	24 Laps			Retirement

Race two

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	km/h	Retirement	Points
1	37	Nick Cassidy	Envision Racing	40	46’34.509					25
2	27	Jake Dennis	Andretti Autosport	40	46’34.951	0.442	0.442			18
3	25	Jean-Eric Vergne	DS Penske	40	46’35.801	1.292	0.850			15
4	9	Mitch Evans	Jaguar Racing	40	46’36.278	1.769	0.477			12
5	13	Antonio Felix da Costa	Porsche Team	40	46’36.969	2.460	0.691			10
6	7	Maximilian Gunther	Maserati Racing	40	46’37.490	2.981	0.521			9
7	94	Pascal Wehrlein	Porsche Team	40	46’38.054	3.545	0.564			6
8	1	Stoffel Vandoorne	DS Penske	40	46’39.360	4.851	1.306			4
9	51	Nico Müller	Team Abt	40	46’41.121	6.612	1.761			2
10	33	Dan Ticktum	NIO Formula E Team	40	46’42.331	7.822	1.210			1
11	23	Sacha Fenestraz	Nissan e.dams	40	46’43.970	9.461	1.639
12	11	Lucas di Grassi	Mahindra Racing	40	46’43.971	9.462	0.001
13	58	René Rast	McLaren	40	46’44.187	9.678	0.216
14	8	Oliver Rowland	Mahindra Racing	40	46’46.289	11.780	2.102
15	3	Sergio Sette Camara	NIO Formula E Team	40	46’48.196	13.687	1.907
16	17	Norman Nato	Nissan e.dams	40	46’48.258	13.749	0.062
17	4	Robin Frijns	Team Abt	40	46’57.446	22.937	9.188			3
18	5	Jake Hughes	McLaren	40	47’04.089	29.580	6.643
19	10	Sam Bird	Jaguar Racing	40	47’08.890	34.381	4.801
20	16	Sébastien Buemi	Envision Racing	40	47’38.041	1’03.532	29.151
21	36	Andre Lotterer	Andretti Autosport	40	47’38.611	1’04.102	0.570
22	48	Edoardo Mortara	Maserati Racing	37	44’18.077	3 Laps	3 Laps

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