Bird beats Jaguar Formula E teammate Evans to New York City E-Prix pole

Bird endured a tough first New York City E-Prix after he crashed heavily in practice, putting him on the backfoot going into qualifying.

The British driver recovered to finish inside the top ten and was the man to beat in Superpole.

Evans’ 1m08.662s stood at the top of the timesheets, just 0.001s ahead of Nick Cassidy.

Having topped group qualifying, Bird maintained his form into the Superpole shootout to secure pole in New York and had Jaguar its first-ever front row lockout.

Evans was left to rue a lock-up into Turn 1, costing him pole position.

Yesterday’s polesitter Cassidy starts third ahead of Pascal Wehrlein, while Sergio Sette Camara impressed for Dragon with fifth.

Andre Lotterer made it two Porsches in the top six ahead of Antonio Felix da Costa.

Next up was the two Mahindras, Alex Lynn just ahead of Alexander Sims, while Norman Nato could only manage tenth in group four.

Rain threatened qualifying throughout with group two impacted the most.

Lucas di Grassi, who finished third in the first New York E-Prix, was the highest driver from group two in 12th place.

Championship leader Edoardo Mortara was only 14th as once again the group one participants struggled pace.

Robin Frijns is level on points in the championship with Mortara but will start from 21st.

Jean-Eric Vergne is set to start this afternoon’s E-Prix from the back of the grid after suffering a mechanical issue on his qualifying lap.

DS Techeetah team principal Mark Preston confirmed that the team will have to investigate the issue after qualifying, stating that Vergne reported a ‘dead throttle’ over team radio.

Click here for the full FIA Formula E qualifying results from the second New York E-Prix.