Cassidy Denies Vandoorne Pole Position for Opening New York City E-Prix

Nick Cassidy took the three points on offer for pole position as he denied Stoffel Vandoorne in the final of the Qualifying duels for race one of the New York City E-Prix on Saturday.

The Envision Racing driver returned to form at the right time to deny Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team’s Vandoorne another FIA Formula E World Championship pole position by just 0.008 seconds, with Cassidy having the edge in the first and third sectors of the lap.

Cassidy had beaten Tag Heuer Porsche FE Team’s Pascal Wehrlein in the semi-finals, while Vandoorne got the better of ROKiT Venturi Racing’s Lucas di Grassi.  However, it will be di Grassi who will line-up third on the grid for the first of the two races this weekend in the United States thanks to having the faster of the two losing times.

The quarter finals had seen Cassidy beat Jaguar TCS Racing’s Sam Bird after the Briton made an early mistake, while Vandoorne got the better of Mahindra Racing’s Alexander Sims despite the latter enjoying the advantage early on.

Di Grassi finished ahead of his long-time rival Sébastien Buemi of Nissan e.dams, while Wehrlein got the better of Envision Racing’s Robin Frijns by eight-tenths of a second.  Buemi will start fifth ahead of Sims, while Frijns and Bird will share row four.

The weather played a key part in the opening group stage, with Group B being dealt a spanner in the works in the form of rain, which shook up the order.

Championship leader Edoardo Mortara was in Group A, but the ROKiT Venturi Racing driver found himself just on the wrong side of the cut-off point at the chequered flag as Buemi found the pace to eliminate him in the closing seconds.

Nyck de Vries was also eliminated from Group A in the second Mercedes and will start eleventh, with Jake Dennis (Avalanche Andretti FE Team) thirteenth. 

Sérgio Sette Câmara (Dragon/Penske Autosport) caused a mid-session red flag after crashing into the wall at the exit of turn fourteen, while Maximilian Günther (Nissan e.dams) crashed at the same point just as the session was ending.  Günther will start fifteenth and Sette Câmara twenty-first, while also eliminated from Group A were Porsche’s André Lotterer and Andretti’s Oliver Askew.

Group B had the more difficult conditions thanks to the rain, and a few of the championship contenders struggled.  Mitch Evans struggled for Jaguar and will start only fourteenth, but he was still ahead of DS Techeetah’s Jean-Éric Vergne in sixteenth.

Former series champion, António Félix da Costa of DS Techeetah, will start tenth after being only fifth fastest in the group, while Mahindra Racing’s Oliver Rowland will start twelfth.

The field is rounded out by NIO 333 FE Team’s Daniel Ticktum (eighteenth), Dragon/Penske Autosport’s Antonio Giovinazzi (twentieth), and the second NIO of Oliver Turvey (twenty-second).

New York City E-Prix Race 1 Qualifying Result