2018 Punta del Este ePrix

Background

The Punta del Este Street Circuit, where the race was held.

The Punta del Este ePrix, discontinued after the 2015–16 Formula E season because no financial agreement was reached by the Government of Uruguay to enable its continuation,^[1] was announced as part of the Formula E calendar in a meeting of the FIA World Motor Sport Council in Paris on 7 December 2017 after the authorities of São Paulo requested a cancellation of their planned race due to a delay in selling land to a private owner.^[2] The Punta del Este ePrix was part of an alternative plan devised by series founder and CEO Alejandro Agag in case any round of the championship was dropped.^[2]

Punta del Este was the sixth of twelve scheduled single-seater electric car rounds of the 2017–18 season and the third edition of the event.^[2][3] The ePrix was held on 17 March 2018 at the twenty-turn 2.785 km (1.731 mi) Punta del Este Street Circuit in the Maldonado Department of Uruguay.^[4] The circuit is situated on the Playa Brava Beach, meaning sand was laid on the tarmac surface and affected the levels of grip available to drivers.^[5] Also, the high ambient temperatures put strain on the car's batteries.^[6] Construction of the track started on 24 February, twenty-two days before the race;^[3] and continued for the next three weeks.^[7] 370 people were employed to work long shifts to complete the project.^[7]

Going into the race, Techeetah driver Jean-Éric Vergne was in the lead of the Drivers' Championship with 81 points, twelve ahead of his nearest rival Felix Rosenqvist of Mahindra in second. Virgin's Sam Bird was in third position with 61 points and e.Dams-Renault driver Sébastien Buemi was a further nine points adrift in fourth. Nelson Piquet Jr. of Jaguar rounded out the top five with 45 points.^[8] Techeetah were at the top of the Teams' Championship with 99 points and the second-placed Mahindra were nine points behind. Jaguar (94 points) and Virgin (90 points) contended for third position and e.Dams-Renault stood in fifth place with 59 points.^[8]

The circuit underwent three cosmetic changes after the most recent edition of the race in 2015.^[9] All bar one of the flexible bollards that were situated around the track in the last two Punta del Este races were removed by officials from the world governing body of motorsport, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), and the "sausage" kerbing at the entry to the circuit's four chicanes was dismantled. However, additional TecPro barriers were erected to improve safety around the track. These changes prompted officials to establish a specific area for drivers to stop in should they miss the turning point for the chicanes before rejoining the track during all sessions.^{[n 1][9]} The alterations received a mixed reception. Piquet spoke his belief that it would assist drivers attacking the track's high-speed sections.^[9] José María López (Dragon) agreed that the kerbing could be negotiated without any major issues and António Félix da Costa (Andretti) praised the "fast and dangerous" nature of the circuit that the changes created.^[10] However, the Audi pair of Lucas di Grassi and Daniel Abt called for the further adjustment of the kerbs as they feared the possibility of an accident occurring.^[10]

On the Wednesday evening before the ePrix, a meeting was held between several drivers, Formula E Teams Association representative and Andretti team principal Roger Griffiths and officials from the FIA to discuss procedures of improving the safety of car switches during the mandatory pit stops. The meeting was called following the communication of further clarifications and remainders to all teams of pit stop procedures and in response to an injury sustained by a Techeetah mechanic by driver André Lotterer in the preceding Mexico City ePrix.^{[n 2][12]} These clarifications included keeping the steering wheel installed in the driver's first car until it came to a halt and the FIA wanted all teams not to fully install the safety harness until the driver clambered into his second vehicle.^[12] Additionally, the FIA stressed that the responsibility of ensuring pit stop and seat belt fastening safety remained with all teams and drivers.^[11] The FIA also added a new regulation authorising stewards to review incidents on and away from the track after the end of future races.^[12]

Practice and qualifying

Tom Blomqvist crashed heavily in the second practice session and changed his gearbox after qualifying.

Two practice sessions—both on Saturday morning—were held before the late afternoon race. The first session ran for 45 minutes and the second lasted half an hour.^[13] A half hour shakedown session topped by López and di Grassi was held on the Friday afternoon prior to practice to allow teams to check the reliability of their cars and electronic systems.^[10][13][14] Conditions for the first practice session were cold and the maximum amount of available grip could not be reached because of the sand on the asphalt surface.^[15] Buemi used the 200 kW (270 hp) available to him and set the session's fastest lap at one minute and 14.536 seconds, 0.343 seconds faster than anyone else on the circuit.^[16] His closest challenger was Mitch Evans (Jaguar) in second and di Grassi placed third. The rest of the top ten were Alex Lynn (Virgin), Vergne, Bird, Piquet, Oliver Turvey (NIO), Abt and Nico Prost (e.Dams-Renault).^[17] During the session, which had several drivers finding their limits with the track and kerbing and causing them to venture into the circuit's run-off areas,^[17][18] Evans stopped in the entry to the pit lane with a technical problem with ten minutes remaining and required outside assistance for recovery to his garage.^[16][17][18] Buemi made a driving error which removed his rear wing endplate by glancing the barriers lining the circuit and this necessitated its replacement.^[15]

Di Grassi was fastest in second practice with a new unofficial track record of one minute and 13.672 seconds,^[19] with Bird and Evans four-tenths of a second adrift in second and third. Turvey, Prost, Vergne, Edoardo Mortara (Venturi), Nick Heidfeld (Mahindra), Tom Blomqvist (Andretti) and Lynn filled positions four to ten.^[20] Blomqvist possibly broke his right-rear suspension when he tapped the turn nine barrier after leaving the corner.^[19][21] Then, an oversteer caused Blomqvist to lose control of the rear of his car and heavily damaged the vehicle in a heavy impact with the turn ten and eleven chicane wall after going over the kerbs. This prompted the session to be red flagged for five minutes, and the size of the impact threw his drivetrain onto the track.^[20]

Saturday's afternoon qualifying session ran for an hour and was divided into four groups of five cars. Each group was determined by a lottery system and was permitted six minutes of on-track activity. All drivers were limited to two timed laps with one at maximum power. The fastest five overall competitors in the four groups participated in a "Super Pole" session with one driver on the track at any time going out in reverse order from fifth to first. Each of the five drivers was limited to one timed lap and the starting order was determined by the competitor's fastest times (Super Pole from first to fifth, and group qualifying from sixth to twentieth). The driver and team who recorded the fastest time were awarded three points towards their respective championships.^[13]

Nelson Piquet Jr. (pictured in 2015) crashed in qualifying and started at the back of the grid.

The first group of five drivers was predicted to be a disadvantage as the circuit was still slippery from the sand being blown from the beaches but had no one make contact with the barriers lining the track.^[22][23] Di Grassi was the early pace setter with Maro Engel, Jérôme d'Ambrosio, Luca Filippi and Blomqvist following in positions two to five.^[23][24] Lynn was the second group's fastest driver despite losing time in the third sector which prevented him from going quickest overall.^[23] Lynn demoted the previous fastest group driver López who made an error on his lap and took third, behind the second-placed Lotterer but ahead of Félix da Costa.^[22][24] Prost was the second group's slowest competitor because he bent his car's steering arm when he came into contact with a trackside bollard and this speared him into the wall at a 45-degree angle at high speed leaving the turn fifteen and sixteen chicane.^[25][26] His team was thus forced to repair his car for the afternoon's race.^[27] In the third group, the conditions of the track had vastly improved that the majority of the drivers were able to go faster than di Grassi in the first and second sectors but none were able to eclipse his overall fastest lap time.^[23] Evans was the fastest of all the five drivers in the group with Turvey following in second. Both demoted Abt to third and Mortara placed fourth.^[22][24] The session was disrupted when Heidfeld approached the turn seventeen chicane too fast and understeered into the TecPro barrier.^[27][28] This was detrimental to Mortara who had to abandon his first attempt at recording a timed lap and was granted dispensation for a second try which he did not take up.^[26]

The fourth group had the first five in the Drivers' Championship eager to compete in the improved track conditions.^[22][26] Vergne eclipsed di Grassi to become the fastest overall driver in the group stages with a lap time of one minute and 13.672 seconds. Buemi lost momentum in the second sector and was second. Bird was the first driver to attempt a timed lap but slower traffic, understeer, and tapping the wall at turn eight meant he took third.^[22][23] Rosenqvist was similarly slow and minor contact with the turn nine wall put him fourth.^[28] Piquet was set to reach super pole but drove over the kerbing at turn ten which sent him into the barriers and started 20th.^[22][27] At the end of group qualifying, the lap times set by Vergne, di Grassi, Lynn, Evans and Turvey were fast enough to enable their progression into super pole.^[23] Di Grassi clinched provisional pole position through a large amount of commitment heading towards the first chicane with a lap of one minute and 13.948 seconds but was put under investigation for hitting the bollard at turn sixteen and seventeen.^[22][25] He was joined on the front row of the grid by Lynn who was 0.241 seconds slower than di Grassi in spite of the latter damaging his front wing by clouting the bollard on his lap.^[25] Evans posted the third-fastest lap after glancing the wall at turn nine through pushing hard.^[23] Turvey drove methodically through the first chicane though he was almost a second slower than Vergne's fastest group qualifying lap due to him being untidy in the final sector and was fourth. Turvey was also placed under investigation for glancing the bollard. Vergne was the favourite to take pole position but an error at the start of his lap restricted him to fifth but avoided contact with the bollard.^[22][23]

Race

Nick Heidfeld's car lost power on the second lap which prompted the ePrix's sole deployment of the safety car.

The race began at 16:03 Uruguay Time (UTC−03:00) on 17 March.^[32] Weather conditions at the start were dry and sunny. The air temperature throughout the ePrix ranged from 28.85 to 30.56 °C (83.93 to 87.01 °F) and the track temperature was between 35.5 and 37.2 °C (95.9 and 99.0 °F).^[24] A special feature of Formula E is the "Fan Boost" feature, an additional 100 kilowatts (130 hp) of power to use in the driver's second car. The three drivers who were allowed to use the boost were determined by a fan vote.^[13] For the Punta del Este round, Abt, Buemi and Rosenqvist were handed the extra power.^[33] The number of laps contested was increased from 33 in 2015 to 37 for 2018 in order to showcase Formula E's technological developments.^[34] Vergne maintained his pole position advantage heading towards the first corner.^[35] Di Grassi stayed in second after withstanding a challenge from Lynn and Turvey followed close behind in fourth.^[35][36] The rest of the field negotiated the chicane without any issues although Mortara ran wide and dropped to the back of the pack.^[37] Di Grassi regained some ground and quickly drew closer to Vergne while Turvey was unable to remain with the leaders and Abt started to battle him. Further back, Lotterer and Bird got close to one another in a battle for sixth.^[35]

Piquet lost positions to Filippi, Rosenqvist and Evans as he was placed wide at the final chicane and Vergne completed the first lap with di Grassi following closely in second. On the second lap, Bird attacked Lotterer approaching the turn eight and nine hairpin but the latter resisted his manoevure.^[37] Soon after, Heidfeid's car deveoped a technical system error that shut it down after leaving the first chicane and he stopped at the side of the track.^[38][39] Race control offered Heidfeld a small amount of time to restart his car but could not do so while his teammate Rosenqvist overtook Filippi for twelfth on the third lap. Meanwhile, Buemi out-braked Bird and passed him for sixth at the turn eight and nine chicane. Buemi slowed to stop him running too deep and prevented Bird from re-passing him.^[37] The safety car was deployed on lap four to enable officials to extract Heidfeld's car and two drivers overtook under these conditions.^[33][40][41] Buemi passed Lotterer and Engel likewise got ahead of Bird but no action was taken against Buemi and Engel.^[37] Vergne led the field back up to speed at the lap-six restart with di Grassi following. The pair gradually began pulling away from Lynn.^[35][36] Piquet fell to the rear of the field when his car began developing drive train problems due to him hitting the wall earlier in the ePrix.^[31][35]

Sébastien Buemi was out of contention for the podium when he damaged his rear-left suspension on lap 11.

Bird got a fast exit leaving the turn one and two chicane, allowing him to draw alongside Lotterer on the inside line entering the turn eight and nine chicane and passed him for sixth. The manoeuvre's effectiveness meant Lotterer lost four places to Engel, Félix da Costa and Rosenqvist within two laps.^[37] On lap 11, Buemi was out of contention for a strong result when he made an error that put him wide onto the dusty line and into the wall.^[42][43] Buemi's barrier glance deranged his left-rear suspension rod and he entered the pit lane to get into his second car on the following lap since the problem had worsened.^[33][38][44] Rosenqvist moved into the top ten soon after by overtaking Félix da Costa and d'Ambrosio. Meanwhile, Abt moved past Turvey for fourth and Rosenqvist was overtaken by Engel.^[33][37] After damaging his vehicle on lap nine, Mortara switched into his second car on the sixteenth lap because steering damage necessitated the change, requiring him to conserve electrical energy for the rest of the ePrix.^[45] Then, as Turvey was saving electrical energy, Bird got ahead of him to claim fifth place and Abt overtook Lynn soon after.^[37]

Vergne was affected by radio communication issues that made him uncertain as to how much electrical energy he had left as di Grassi followed close behind but was unable to affect an overtaking manoevure by the time they entered the pit lane for the switch into their second cars on lap 19 with the majority of the field following suit.^[40][42][43] López led for one lap before he, d'Ambrosio and Prost came in on the next lap.^[24] After the pit stops, Vergne and di Grassi retained first and second places. Abt was third and Bird left the pit lane alongside teammate Lynn and got past him for fourth.^[35][36] Similarly, Rosenqvist and Evans moved to fifth and sixth.^[24][33] Di Grassi attempted to pass Vergne around the outside driving towards turn seventeen on his first lap out of the pit lane and the pair briefly made contact which led to di Grassi locking his brakes and got sideways.^[33][40][43] Di Grassi lost almost two seconds of time but began closing back up to Vergne.^[42][43] Two laps later, Bird was pressuring Abt and the battle continued until Abt went into the pit lane on lap 23 because his seat belts unbuckled under braking though post-race data confirmed that the shoulder harnesses were correctly fitted.^[38][46] Abt rejoined in 15th after Bird took over third.^[35]

Jean-Éric Vergne withstood pressure from Lucas di Grassi for the majority of the race to win his second race of the season.

Before lap 28 ended, Evans overtook Rosenqvist for fifth and the latter attempted to regain the position by using FanBoost but was unsuccessful.^[33][37] Upfront, di Grassi made several unsuccessful attempts at passing Vergne and their battle allowed Bird to close up.^[38][40] López earned one point for setting the race's fastest lap on lap 31 by completing a circuit in one minute and 16.811 seconds.^[24] Two laps later, Lynn lost fourth to Evans who put him onto the dirty side of the track and overtook him on the outside through turn thirteen. Lynn was then left to fend off Rosenqvist.^[36][37] Di Grassi's best opportunity to pass Vergne was denied at the end of lap 34 as he nudged the latter wide at the final corner but was not able to accelerate faster than Vergne on the start/finish straight and gain the lead.^[37] The duel for first was the main focus for the rest of the race. It enabled Bird to get his best chance of taking the lead but was denied his opportunity when he made a minor driving error on the final lap.^[33][40] This along with Bird being required to conserve electrical energy and manage battery temperatures dropped him out of contention.^[42]

Di Grassi made one final try of claiming victory which had him gently nudge the rear of Vergne's car approaching the final turn but Vergne maintained his advantage on the start/finish line to clinch his second win of the season and the third of his career.^[38][40] Di Grassi finished 0.447 seconds behind in second place and Bird completed the podium in third position. Off the podium, Evans took fourth with Rosenqvist moving past Lynn late in the ePrix to claim fifth and Turvey placed seventh. The Dragon duo of López and d'Ambrosio took eighth and ninth due to their strategy of running one lap longer than the rest of the field and Engel completed the top ten. Félix da Costa, Lotterer, Filippi, Abt, Prost, Blomqvist and Mortara were the last of the classified finishers.^[47] Of the other two retirements, Buemi completed just 29 laps after he could not reach the end of the race due to his early car swap and Piquet's drive shaft failed completely after 25 laps.^[44]

Post-race

Sam Bird dedicated his third-place finish to broadcaster and motorsports journalist Henry Hope-Frost.

The top three drivers appeared on the podium to collect their trophies and spoke to the media in a later press conference. Vergne remarked that the win was possibly "the hardest [of his three victories], and probably the one I'm most happy with in terms of my driving, my whole race", and that while his team lacked the resources that others had to improve the car, the race demonstrated "the proof to everybody that I have a lot of pace."^[48] Second-placed di Grassi spoke of his annoyance over losing pole position which he did not feel was fair. While he acknowledged that overtaking was difficult in Punta del Este, he congratulated Vergne on the victory, "Today we had the fastest car for pole and to win but we came second."^[41] He affirmed that this would not be the last time that Audi would be contending for victories in the season.^[48] Bird dedicated his third-place to broadcaster and motorsports journalist Henry Hope-Frost who was killed instantly when his motorbike collided with a car on the A286 road near Haslemere in Surrey nine days prior to the ePrix, "There was a lot of fever out there today and I think he’d have been pretty happy with the driving out there today."^[31][49] He spoke of his effort of staying within reach of Vergne and di Grassi and revealed he wanted them to challenge both slightly more so he could have an opportunity of winning the race.^[50]

Di Grassi was summoned to meet the stewards after the race and was handed a €10,000 (£8,750) fine and three penalty points on his race licence for wearing non-compliant fireproof underwear but was allowed to retain second in what was described by AOL's Andrew Evans as "one of the strangest racing penalties ever seen."^[51] Di Grassi apologised to the stewards and vowed that it would not be repeated in the future and revealed to the press that he made the decision because Punta del Este's hot weather conditions caused his previous pair to soak up body sweat.^[52] The stewards also investigated Abt's seat belt incident but decided that no further action was necessary.^[46] Abt was mystified as to how his seat belts had become unbuckled under braking, saying, "This we have to figure out, but of course in that situation what do you do? You risk your life or you come in - for me it's no choice."^[46] Audi team principal Allan McNish surmised that Abt's issue prevented the driver from getting onto the podium but was more positive that both his team's cars had reached the end of the race.^[46]

Mitch Evans gained twelve positions off the grid to finish fourth.

Evans reckoned he could have taken his first victory and revealed the weight issue that demoted him to 16th was due to a change of battery between second practice and qualifying that was 3 kg (6.6 lb) lighter than the one it replaced but respected the steward's consistency, "We can't argue with it - that's the way it rolls. We had a good fast car, and I'm happy to be heading to the next few races hopefully in a position to fight for the win."^[53] Evans's view was reiterated by Jaguar team principal James Barclay who reserved praise for the driver's fast pace, overtaking abilities and the car, "The reality is, we’ve shown we have the car that’s really fast. I’m not surprised considering how much work we’ve put into it, but it’s really positive to see that we’ve made one of the biggest steps and that’s really good and I’m really proud of the team."^[54] Buemi apologised to his team for hitting the wall on lap eleven and stated his belief he could have completed around three or four additional laps had the safety car been deployed for a second time.^[55]

The consequence of the final positions enabled Vergne to further extend his advantage at the top of the Drivers' Championship to 30 points over Rosenqvist while Bird's third-place finish allowed him to further close the deficit to the latter by five points. Buemi remained in fourth place despite his non-finish and Piquet similarly retained fifth position after his failure to reach the end of the ePrix.^[8] Techeetah increased their Teams' Championship lead over the second-placed Mahindra to 27 points in front while Virgin's results moved them to third place. Jaguar followed a further seven points behind in fourth and e.Dams-Renault maintained fifth position with six races left in the season.^[8] Though he reiterated his happiness over winning the race, Vergne admitted he was focused on the championship battle and approached it by employing a race-by-race basis.^[56]

Qualifying

Pos.	No.	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Grid
1	25	Jean-Éric Vergne	Techeetah-Renault	1:16.806	—	1
2	1	Lucas di Grassi	Audi	—	—	21
3	36	Alex Lynn	Virgin-Citroën	—	—	31
4	16	Oliver Turvey	NIO	—	—	41
5	66	Daniel Abt	Audi	1:14.224	+0.043	5
6	9	Sébastien Buemi	e.Dams-Renault	1:14.320	+0.139	6
7	18	André Lotterer	Techeetah-Renault	1:14.442	+0.261	7
8	5	Maro Engel	Venturi	1:14.523	+0.342	8
9	2	Sam Bird	Virgin-Citroën	1:14.552	+0.371	9
10	7	Jérôme d'Ambrosio	Dragon-Penske	1:14.673	+0.492	10
11	28	António Félix da Costa	Andretti-BMW	1:14.973	+0.792	11
12	19	Felix Rosenqvist	Mahindra	1:15.104	+0.923	12
13	68	Luca Filippi	NIO	1:15.444	+1.263	152
14	4	Edoardo Mortara	Venturi	1:15.493	+1.312	13
15	27	Tom Blomqvist	Andretti-BMW	1:16.624	+2.243	203
16	3	Nelson Piquet Jr.	Jaguar	1:42.656	+28.475	14
17	8	Nico Prost	e.Dams-Renault	1:53.358	+39.177	19
18	20	Mitch Evans	Jaguar	—	—	164
19	23	Nick Heidfeld	Mahindra	—	—	17
20	6	José María López	Dragon-Penske	—	—	185
Source:[24]

Notes:

• ^1 —Lucas di Grassi, Alex Lynn and Oliver Turvey had their lap times deleted and demoted one place for exceeding track limits during super pole.^[29]
• ^2 —Luca Filippi dropped three positions for speeding under red flag conditions during the second practice session.^[29]
• ^3 —Tom Blomqvist started from the back of the grid for changing his gearbox.^[29]
• ^4 —Mitch Evans had his lap time deleted and was demoted to 16th because his car's weight distribution was 300 g (11 oz) outside the amount permitted.^[30]
• ^5 —José María López started from 18th as two of his tyres were below the minimum mandated pressure of 1.60-bar (160 kPa).^[31]

Race

Pos.	No.	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	25	Jean-Éric Vergne	Techeetah-Renault	37	50:43.809	1	286
2	1	Lucas di Grassi	Audi	37	+0.447	2	18
3	2	Sam Bird	Virgin-Citroën	37	+2.611	9	15
4	20	Mitch Evans	Jaguar	37	+4.075	16	12
5	19	Felix Rosenqvist	Mahindra	37	+4.224	12	10
6	36	Alex Lynn	Virgin-Citroën	37	+7.672	3	8
7	16	Oliver Turvey	NIO	37	+11.818	4	6
8	6	José María López	Dragon-Penske	37	+12.612	18	57
9	7	Jérôme d'Ambrosio	Dragon-Penske	37	+22.242	10	2
10	5	Maro Engel	Venturi	37	+26.293	8	1
11	28	António Félix da Costa	Andretti-BMW	37	+27.335	11
12	18	André Lotterer	Techeetah-Renault	37	+38.731	7
13	68	Luca Filippi	NIO	37	+39.926	15
14	66	Daniel Abt	Audi	37	+43.139	5
15	8	Nico Prost	e.Dams-Renault	37	+47.194	19
16	27	Tom Blomqvist	Andretti-BMW	37	+59.299	20
17	4	Edoardo Mortara	Venturi	36	+1 Lap	13
Ret	9	Sébastien Buemi	e.Dams-Renault	29	Energy	6
Ret	3	Nelson Piquet Jr.	Jaguar	25	Drive shaft	14
Ret	23	Nick Heidfeld	Mahindra	1	Power	17
Source:[24]

Notes:

• ^6 — Three points for pole position.^[13]
• ^7 — One point for fastest lap.^[13]

Notes

References