Championship contender Jake Dennis laid down the gauntlet ahead of Qualifying for the Berlin E-Prix once more, putting in a rapid lap to go over a tenth clear of Lucas di Grassi.
The 26-year old rookie driver has gone from strength-to-strength across the season and is looking to add a third victory to his tally and give BMW a perfect send-off in their final race weekend as a manufacturer.
Despite the 8AM start, temperatures at the Tempelhof Airport Street Circuit were already beginning to creep up beyond 18 degrees Celsius and it was Nissan e.dams Oliver Rowland whose time of a 1:07.056 narrowly edged out Mercedes’ EQ’s Stoffel Vandoorne at the halfway mark.
The DS Techeetah duo of Jean-Eric Vergne and Antonio Felix da Costa then led the way as the times continued to tumble.
As drivers got their Qualifying simulations underway, it was Dennis who jumped to the top of the timing sheets from 20th with his 250kW lap of 1:06.228, going three-tenths clear of Mercedes EQ’s Nyck de Vries.
His rapid performance proved to be unbeatable. Di Grassi could only close the gap to 0.154 seconds as Audi prepare to exit Formula E at the end of the season.
It was a better session for championship leader de Vries in third, just ahead of his closest rival Robin Frijns. The Envision Virgin is the only driver to have completed every race lap of the 2020/21 season but was fortunate to avoid suspension damage after kissing the wall at Turn 4 earlier in practice.
TAG Heuer Porsche’s Pascal Wehrlein will be hoping to retain the best Qualifying average of season as he finished the session in fifth, ahead of the second BMW i Andretti of Maximilian Guenther.
Vandoorne was seventh and despite struggling with some oversteer, he finished ahead of the DS Techeetah pair of da Costa and Vergne. Meanwhile, rookie Norman Nato rounded out the top 10 for ROKiT Venturi.
Jaguar’s Sam Bird could only manage the 12th fastest time, as all but Joel Eriksson clocked in a lap within a second of Dennis’ leading time.
