Di Grassi beats Lopez to pole by one thousandth!

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Di Grassi beats Lopez to pole by one thousandth!

Di Grassi beats Lopez to pole by one thousandth!

Lucas di Grassi scored three bonus points for Julius Baer Pole Position after beating Jose Maria Lopez by just a thousandth of a second in qualifying for the Berlin ePrix.

Di Grassi scored his second career pole despite carrying an ankle injury sustained in a football match earlier in the week and being the first of the runners to go out into the one-lap shoot-out. It was the closest-ever qualifying shoot-out in Formula E history.

Di Grassi: “We did a job, I did a very good lap and I’m happy to put the car on pole in front of my home crowd. To be on pole by one thousandth - I think it’s about 5 centimetres!”

Felix Rosenqvist was fastest in the qualifying group stages, and was the last of the five runners to hit the track. But despite being ahead of di Grassi in the first and second sectors, he lost a crucial amount of time in the final corner and ended up third, just 0.083s off pole!

His Mahindra team-mate Nick Heidfeld lines up fourth, while Sam Bird, who was second fastest in the group stages, produced a scrappy lap and ended up fifth.

The biggest casualty of the group stages was championship leader Sebastien Buemi. Despite running in the final group, the reigning champion was not happy with the handling of his Renault e.dams and will line up 14th for this afternoon’s race.

“It’s really bad,” he said. “I had a lot of oversteer and couldn’t put the lap together. Hopefully we can score some points, but it’s going to be a tough one. The speed is not there, but hopefully we can find some speed in the race.”

Jean-Eric Vergne was the fastest of the drivers who didn’t make Super Pole and he starts sixth alongside NextEV’s Oliver Turvey. Local favourite Daniel Abt was eighth for Abt Schaeffler Audi Sport. Nico Prost will start ninth while Jerome D’Ambrosio did a good job to set the 10th best time for Faraday Future Dragon Racing.

The race starts at 4pm local time. To find out where you can watch it, click here

 

Qualifying times

1. Lucas di Grassi, Abt Schaeffler Audi Sport, 1:08.312

2. Jose Maria Lopez, DS Virgin Racing, 1:08.313

3. Felix Rosenqvist, Mahindra Racing, 1:08.395

4. Nick Heidfeld, Mahindra Racing, 1:08.650

5. Sam Bird, DS Virgin Racing. 1:09.724

6. Jean Eric Vergne, TECHEETAH, 1:08.457

7. Oliver Turvey, NextEV NIO, 1:08.607

8. Daniel Abt, Abt Schaeffler Audi Sport, 1:08.620

9. Nico Prost, Renault e.dams, 1:08.692

10. Jerome D'Ambrosio, Faraday Future Dragon Racing, 1:08.825

11. Maro Engel, Venturi, 1:08.846

12. Stephane Sarrazin, TECHEETAH 1:08.890

13. Nelson Piquet Jr, NextEV NIO, , 1:08.961

14. Sebastien Buemi, Renault e.dams, 1:09.010

15. Tom Dillmann, Venturi, 1:09.214

16. Mitch Evans, Panasonic Jaguar Racing, 1:09.216

17. Robin Frijns, Andretti, 1:09.630

18. Adam Carroll, Panasonic Jaguar Racing, 1:09.898

19. Loic Duval, Faraday Future Dragon Racing, 1:09.923

20. Antonio Felix da Costa, Andretti, 1:11.147