Mercedes’ Vandoorne storms to pole for first Valencia E-Prix

Mercedes’ Stoffel Vandoorne has claimed his second Formula E pole position of the season after beating Techeetah’s Antonio Felix da Costa to top spot in Valencia.

Having progressed from the first qualifying group, Vandoorne’s 1m26.494s in the Superpole shootout was enough for him to displace da Costa’s impressive provisional pole benchmark by 0.028s.

Pole position for Vandoorne in Valencia means Mercedes has taken pole in three of the first five races this season.

Nyck de Vries made it two Mercedes in the top three, 0.236s shy of his teammate.

The Dutchman won’t start from third as he will drop five places on the grid after picking up a penalty for colliding with Sam Bird in Rome.

This promotes Maximilian Gunter, Alexander Lynn and Sebastian Buemi - the trio made Superpole, but couldn’t get close to Vandoorne.

Andre Lotterer and Norman Nato narrowly missed out on a spot in SuperPole having set their best efforts in the fourth qualifying group. 

Oliver Rowland and Pascal Wehrlein rounded out the top ten with just 0.004s separating the duo.

Nick Cassidy narrowly missed out on a top ten spot in the Virgin, beating Alexander Sims and Jean-Eric Vergne.

Jake Dennis and Rene Rast completed the top 15, ahead of a disappointed Robin Frijns in 16th.

Venturi’s Edoardo Mortara couldn’t match teammate Nato’s effort after a major mistake in the first sector.

It was a disastrous qualifying for championship leader Sam Bird.

Bird was in the first qualifying group but continued to struggle for pace, qualifying 21st, while Jaguar teammate Mitch Evans could only manage 18th.

After qualifying, Bird said he struggled with “rotation” as he looks to maintain his lead in the championship in this afternoon’s E-Prix.

Lucas di Grassi, Nico Müller and Oliver Turvey round out the grid. 

Click here to find out the full qualifying results for the Valencia E-Prix (Race 1).