Abt Audi Sport’s Lucas di Grassi has taken his maiden Formula E pole position in Buenos Aries, narrowly beating Techeetah’s Jean-Eric Vergne.
Di Grassi topped superpole with a 1m09.404 just under two-tenths ahead of the Frenchman. Championship leader Sebastien Buemi was forced to settle for third place after a scruffy superpole lap.
GROUP ONE
As qualifying got underway, the first group of five cars consisted of DS Virgin’s Sam Bird, Venturi’s Maro Engel, Andretti’s Robin Frijns and Jaguar’s Adam Carroll and Mitch Evans.
Engel had a troubled session, with his Venturi grinding to a halt on multiple occasions, he will line up 20th and last in the ePrix.
It was a sloppy session for Bird who brushed the wall on his flyer and ended up three-tenths off the pace. Frijns also had a scruffy lap and ended up behind the British driver.
Carroll set the fourth quickest time and was significantly outpaced by his teammate Evans who was the surprise of the session with the fastest time, a 1m09.505s.
GROUP TWO
With di Grassi, Vergne, Nelson Piquet Jr, Jerome d’Ambrosio and championship leader Buemi in the second group, there was no doubting that this was the strongest group on paper.
D’Ambrosio struggled for pace and consistency in practice and this continued in qualifying as the Belgium was slowest of the five Q2 drivers.
Hong Kong poleman Piquet Jr. put his NextEV TCR 002 into fourth place just behind di Grassi who qualified third despite taking out of the bollard at the infamous chicane.
Reigning champion Buemi was the favourite going into the session and set the fastest lap but then Vergne eclipsed him with a 1m08:751s with the fastest ever lap time around this circuit.
GROUP THREE
The third qualifying session was slightly delayed due to the bollard been repaired. First practice pacesetter Jose Maris Lopez, Felix Rosenqvist, Loic Duval, Antonio Felix da Costa and Venturi’s Stephane Sarrazin competed in this session.
Da Costa’s practice woes continued when he stopped on track almost immediately, however, he eventually managed to get going and the session was able to go green again.
Lopez was fastest in the first sector, but lost a tenth in the second sector and then hit the wall in the final sector. Duval also hit trouble and could only manage 11th, with the final five drivers still to set their lap.
Sarrazin went eighth quickest but was beaten by Rosenqvist who recovered from a sloppy opening start to the lap to end strongly and just miss out on a place in superpole.
Da Costa was unable to initially complete his lap due to the red flag caused by Lopez, but was granted another chance to do his flying lap by the stewards. However, Da Costa’s nightmare day continued as he crashed his Andretti ATEC-02 into the inside wall at the chicane before even starting his flying lap.
GROUP FOUR
The final group consisted of NextEV’s Oliver Turvey, Techeetah’s Ma Qing Hua, Mahindra Racing’s Nick Heidfeld, Abt Audi Sport’s Daniel Abt and Renault e.dams’ Nicolas Prost.
Prost was first to complete his lap, a 1m09.442s which put him into fifth and knocked Evans out of the superpole positions. Meanwhile Abt struggled as he hit the wall and therefore could only manage 16th.
Ma also hit the wall and prematurely ended his session, meaning he will start 19th in the ePrix and thus limiting his chances of ending his points drought.
Turvey was the star of the session as he narrowly edged Prost by just over a tenth to make it two NextEVs in superpole.
SUPERPOLE
After four qualifying sessions and multiple delays, superpole finally got underway with Piquet Jr, Turvey, di Grassi, Buemi and Vergne all taking part.
Piquet was the first of the NextEV cars to go out, but he struggled for grip and could only manage a 1m11.274s. Piquet’s teammate Turvey fared much better with a 1m10.075s but also really struggled to find the grip and locked the brakes into Turn 7, losing him multiple tenths of a second.
Di Grassi was slightly slower than Turvey in the first and second sector but he clawed back time in the final sector to set a 1m09.404s to go quickest with just Buemi and Vergne to go.
Buemi locked his brakes into Turn 1 and lost half a second. This ultimately cost him a chance at pole position and he was forced to settle for second.
Vergne was the final car to leave the pitlane and it looked like it was a case of leaving the best to last. The Frenchman was quickest through the first two sectors but was ultimately beaten by the Brazilian and denied a fifth Formula E pole.
