It will be an all yellow-and-blue front row for this afternoon’s SWUSP Beijing ePrix after Sebastien Buemi beat Renault-e.dams team-mate Nico Prost to claim the first ever Julius Baer Super Pole.
After the pace the Renault-e.dams drivers had shown in practice and the previous test session, it was no surprise that they were on top, but they were split during the group sessions by DS Virgin’s Jean-Eric Vergne.
However, in the one-lap shoot-out between the top five, the Frenchman had a huge lock-up and overshot the corner. This left him as the slowest of the five runners and he will start from the third row.
Nick Heidfeld did an excellent job to get his Mahindra into Super Pole and the German will start third for the race. However, his best lap of 1:38.339s was over a second down on Buemi.
Lucas di Grassi was the fifth member of the Super Pole quintet and the first to go out. He too had a big lock-up, but was at least able to make the corner and starts fourth.
Places 6-18 – the Trulli cars were not entered for the race – were decided by the group stages. A great effort by Stephane Sarrazin took the Venturi driver to the fringes of the top five and he’ll start sixth for Venturi.
Bruno Senna will line-up seventh for Mahindra alongside Loic Duval’s Dragon. Sam Bird was the ninth fastest man in the group stages, while Jerome D’Ambrosio completes the top 10 for Dragon.
After a tough couple of practice sessions, things didn’t improve much for Nelson Piquet Jr, and the reigning champion will start 18th and last for NEXTEV TCR’s home race.
GRANDPRIX20.COM 