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Evans claims dominant win in Berlin E-Prix opener
Mitch Evans dominated the first race of the Berlin E-Prix while Pascal Wehrlein kept his championship hopes alive with second place as points leader Oliver Rowland retired.
Jaguar TCS Racing driver Mitch Evans was in a class of his own in the first half of the 39-lap race – subsequently extended to 41 after a pair of safety car periods – and held a 3.4-second lead over Wehrlein when he made his Pit Boost stop on lap 24.
But in the final stages of the race, Wehrlein – aided by taking his last Attack Mode on lap 35, two after Evans – closed to within 0.7s behind Evans. His hopes of a victory faded on the penultimate lap, though, when he ran deep into Turns 9-10, paving the way for Evans to bring it home for his 14th Formula E victory, moving him to joint-first with Sebastien Buemi at the top of the all-time win list.
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Taylor Barnard completed a late charge up the order to finish fourth, ahead of Nick Cassidy who capped off a stellar day for Jaguar by finishing fifth after starting 21st and serving a drive through penalty for a component change.
Maximilian Guenther salvaged points for DS Penske in sixth, his teammate Jean-Eric Vergne failed to finish after retiring on lap 32 with a failure of a common front upright component.
Nico Mueller and Dan Ticktum, along with the penalized da Costa completed the points scorers.
Rowland came into the weekend needing a second place and Wehrlein not scoring in order to clinch the title. The reality was the reverse, with Rowland retiring on lap 33 after making contact with Stoffel Vandoorne at Turn 7.
He and Vergne were joined in retirement by David Beckmann, who was hit by Sergio Sette Camara at Turn 4 on lap 29. That brought out the second of the day’s safety cars, with Beckmann initially trying to continue but stopping at Turn 5 with suspension damage.
The first safety car came on the opening lap when Jake Dennis failed to get away from the grid. Dennis was able to perform a customary burnout into his grid position, but when the lights went out, he had no power, and the issue is still being diagnosed by the Andretti team.
With 19 points gained, including one for fastest lap, Wehrlein closes the gap to Rowland to 50 points, with a 58-point buffer needed by Rowland to seal the championship. Barnard moves up to third, a further 18 points back, while da Casta drops to fourth, five behind Barnard.
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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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