Andrew Ferraro/Motorsport Images
Hughes beats Vergne to second Misano E-Prix pole
Jake Hughes will start the second race of the Misano E-Prix from pole position after defeating Jean-Eric Vergne in the final of the head-to-head Duels.
Pole for the NEOM McLaren driver comes a day after he lost fourth on the grid for Saturday’s race because his car’s fire extinguisher was not armed during qualifying. On Sunday, he defeated Stoffel Vandoorne in the quarterfinals, setting the fastest lap of the day – a 1m16.423s. He then defeated TAG Heuer Porsche's pascal Wehrlein in the semifinals, but it was a narrow victory, only by 0.053s, after he went sideways in the final turn.
For Vergne it was a second final defeat in as many days, but his appearance there was a somewhat fortuitous occurrence after a track limits penalty for Nick Cassidy. Cassidy beat the DS Penske driver in their quarter final Duel, but was judged to have run too wide at the final turn, with his lap time subsequently deleted.
Vergne then went on to beat Nico Mueller in the semifinals, a head-to-head where both had trouble with the ABT Cupra driver losing over a second after a brief loss of power, while Vergne had to complete his lap without his dashboard display working.
Hughes started qualifying by topping the second group session, ahead of Wehrlein, teammate Sam Bird, and Vandoorne.
Jake Dennis fell from the top-four transfer spots in the final seconds of the session as Bird improved on his time. The reigning champion described his fastest lap as the “best I’ve ever done,” but with continued car stuggled, particularly with braking, it wasn't enough to get him through to the Duels.
Sergio Sette Camara, Sacha Fenestraz, Mitch Evans, Sebastein Buemi, Edorardo Mortara and Jehan Daruvala also all failed to advance.
Meanwhile, the first group was headed by Cassidy, but only after a late fast lap – his first was also deleted for a track limits violation. He finished ahead of Frijns, Mueller, and Vergne, with Rowland – who inherited Saturday's race win – left on the fringes after aborting his final flying lap after losing time at Turn 8.
Joining him in failing to progress was Maximilian Guenther, Lucas di Grassi, Norman Nato, Dan Ticktum, Nyck de Vries, and Antonio Felix da Costa.
Da Costa, Saturday's on-the-road winner before he was disqualified, had set the third-fastest time in Group A but had that time deleted for a track limits violation, and unlike Cassidy, had no time to set another time to make up for it.
Hughes’s pole is the third of his Formula E career, while Vergne’s second place start will be a record 25th front-row start for him.
For the second day in a row, Wehrlein will start third, alongside Mueller, with Bird fifth, Vandoorne sixth, Frijns seventh, and Cassidy eighth after he was unable to progress further through the Duels after his penalty.
Dennis and Rowland complete the top 10, with Sette Camara and Guenther behind them. Fenestraz will line up 13th, alongside di Grassi, with Evans and Nato 15th and 16th respectively. Buemi, Ticktum, Mortara, de Vries, Daruvala, and the embattled da Costa.
Dominik Wilde
Dominik often jokes that he was born in the wrong country – a lover of NASCAR and IndyCar, he covered both in a past life as a junior at Autosport in the UK, but he’s spent most of his career to date covering the sliding and flying antics of the U.S.’ interpretation of rallycross. Rather fitting for a man that says he likes “seeing cars do what they’re not supposed to do”, previously worked for a car stunt show, and once even rolled a rally car with Travis Pastrana. He was also comprehensively beaten in a kart race by Sebastien Loeb once, but who hasn’t been?
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