Hong Kong ePrix – Mahindra Racing’s Felix Rosenqvist beat Jaguar’s Mitch Evans to claim his fourth Formula E pole for Sunday’s Hong Kong race.
The Swiss racer was fourth in the group stages, but overcame an oversteering car on his super pole lap to set a 1:02.836, beating Evans by 0.054s with the Kiwi giving Jaguar its first super pole appearance.
Edoardo Mortara was third fastest for Venturi, beating Sam Bird by one-thousandth-of-a-second. The DS Virgin driver qualified fourth but takes a 10-place grid penalty for his pit lane crash during Saturday’s race, so starts 14th.
Daniel Abt was fifth after touching the wall on his super pole lap.
Lucas di Grassi went out in the first group, which is considered a disadvantage, and was only 13th fastest, more than three-quarters-of-a-second behind Evans’ benchmark group qualifying time.
His rival from last season Sebastien Buemi suffered his worst Formula E career qualifying. The 2015/16 champion touched the inside wall at Turn 5, damaging his car and leaving him 20th and last.
Rookie Alex Lynn was sixth fastest, ahead of Andretti’s Antonio Felix da Costa who was four tenths away from the top.
Saturday’s polesitter Jean-Eric Vergne was eighth, ahead of the two NIOs of Oliver Turvey and his rookie team mate Luca Filippi.
Fellow rookie Kamui Kobayashi was 16th for Andretti, with Andre Lotterer just behind for Techeetah. Neel Jani went wide at Turn 2 so was 19th behind his Dragon team mate Jerome D’Ambrosio.