2018 Rome ePrix

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Date 14 April 2018 (2018-04-14)
Official name 2018 CBMM Niobium Rome E-Prix Presented By Mercedes EQ[3]
Course Street circuit
2018 Rome ePrix
Race 7 of 12 of the 2017–18 Formula E Championship
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Race details[1][2]
Date 14 April 2018 (2018-04-14)
Official name 2018 CBMM Niobium Rome E-Prix Presented By Mercedes EQ[3]
Location Circuto Cittadino dell'EUR, EUR, Rome
Course Street circuit
Course length 2.860 km (1.777 mi)
Distance 33 laps, 94.38 km (58.65 mi)
Weather Dry but cloudy
Attendance 45,000
Pole position
Driver Mahindra
Time 1:36.311
Fastest lap
Driver Germany Daniel Abt Audi
Time 1:37.910 on lap 30
Podium
First Virgin-Citroën
Second Audi
Third Techeetah-Renault
Lap leaders

The 2018 Rome ePrix (formally the 2018 CBMM Niobium Rome E-Prix Presented By Mercedes EQ) was a Formula E electric car race held at the Circuito Cittadino dell'EUR in the EUR residential and business district of the Italian capital of Rome on 14 April 2018 before a crowd of 45,000 people. It was the seventh round of the 2017–18 Formula E Championship and the inaugural running of the event. The 33-lap race was won by Virgin driver Sam Bird from a second position start. Lucas di Grassi finished second for Audi and Techeetah driver André Lotterer took third.

Felix Rosenqvist of Mahindra won the pole position by recording the fastest lap in qualifying and maintained the lead through the mandatory pit stops for the change into a second car until he hit a kerb on the 22nd lap and retired with a broken rear-left suspension. That allowed Bird into the lead but he was challenged by Jaguar's Mitch Evans, who had made a pit stop one lap later and had more electrical energy, with four laps left but he could not get ahead. Evans was then passed by di Grassi and Lotterer in the final laps as his energy depleted and Bird held off di Grassi to take his second victory of the season and the seventh of his career.

The result allowed Jean-Éric Vergne of Techeetah to retain his lead in the Drivers' Championship but his points advantage was reduced to 18 as Bird's victory put him ahead of Rosenqvist. e.Dams-Renault driver Sébastien Buemi maintained fourth and di Grassi's teammate Daniel Abt moved into fifth after coming fourth. Techeetah extended their advantage in the Teams' Championship to thirty-eight points over Virgin. Mahindra scored no points and fell to third with five races left in the season.

Preview

Coming into the race from Punta del Este four weeks earlier, Techeetah driver Jean-Éric Vergne led the Drivers' Championship with 109 points and was 30 points ahead of Felix Rosenqvist of Mahindra in second. Virgin's Sam Bird was a further three points behind in third and Sébastien Buemi of e.Dams-Renault was fourth with a total of 52 points accrued. Jaguar driver Nelson Piquet Jr. was fifth with 45 points.[4] Techeetah led the Teams' Championship with 127 points; Mahindra followed 27 points behind in second position. Virgin (93 points) and Jaguar (86) were third and fourth and e.Dams-Renault were fifth with 59 points.[4] There were ten teams fielding two drivers each for a total of 20 participants for the event.[5]

After the world governing body of motorsport, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), abolished the minimum pit stop time at the Santiago ePrix three races ago, Techeetah and Dragon were fined for modifying their seat felts and André Lotterer (Techeetah) clipped one of his mechanics in Mexico. These events prompted the FIA to hand all teams two cameras to aid the stewards in analysing footage after the race and were instructed to install them above the second car of their respective drivers and be positioned in an unobstructed area of the garage effective from the Rome ePrix.[6] Jean Todt, the FIA president, reiterated his position that the responsibility of ensuring safe pit stops laid solely with teams and drivers and revealed that the decision to discard the minimum pit stop time was made following two years of research, "If you want to try and save time and to be unbuckled before you stop, [or] to buckle after you have started – you will be reported to the stewards to make some strong decisions. But if you follow the rules and the procedure, I feel that there is no problem of safety. I hope that every driver and every team will be responsible and we shouldn't have any problems."[6]

Preparations

Virginia Raggi (pictured in 2016) was instrumental in getting Rome onto the Formula E calendar after the city's previous administration abandoned the plan.

Plans for a Formula E race around the streets of the Italian capital of Rome were discussed on 1 December 2012 by Todt, and series founder and CEO Alejandro Agag with Gianni Alemanno, the mayor. They agreed to hold a race in the city in the 2014–15 Championship.[7] On 1 October 2013 however, these plans changed when the initial season calendar was released, dropping the Rome race with Hong Kong. A new administration had been elected in the intervening period of time and it decided against taking further action in restoring the ePrix to the calendar.[8] But, the project was revitalised when in November 2016, Rome's councillor for sports Daniele Frongia told news agency Agenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata that the recently elected administration of Virginia Raggi was in the process of planning for major events slated for 2017 and 2018. Raggi maintained written correspondence with the FIA concerning the restoration of Rome to the Formula E calendar.[9]

After a meeting of councillors at Rome City Hall, Agag met Raggi and a congregation of city officials in February 2017 to discuss a series of requests and evaluated a potential circuit. The group held another meeting a few weeks later for further negotiation.[10] Two months later on 20 April, the proposal for a motor race on the streets of Rome was put forward to authorities from the local assembly who voted unanimously in favour to approve permits to allow racing in the city's EUR residential and business district for the next five years.[11] The ePrix was added to the FIA's provisional 2017–18 calendar on 19 June,[12] and was officially confirmed as part of the series by the FIA World Motor Sport Council three months later.[13] It was the seventh of twelve scheduled single seater electric car rounds of the 2017–18 Championship and occurred at the Circuito Cittadino dell'EUR street circuit on 18 April 2018.[14] Prior to the ePrix, Rome last hosted a street circuit race at the Baths of Caracalla in 1951.[15] Organisers expected 30,000 people to attend the ePrix.[16]

The layout of the 21-turn 2.86 km (1.78 mi) street circuit was unveiled to the public on 19 October 2017. It was the second longest track on the Formula E calendar after the Circuit International Automobile Moulay El Hassan in Marrakesh.[14][17] The start line was positioned on the Via Cristoforo Colombo and the finish line was positioned near the Marconi Obelisk. The circuit negotiated past major city buildings such as the Rome Convection Center and the Palazzo dei Congressi.[18] Construction of the track began on 3 April, eleven days before the ePrix, and was completed on 12 April. It was dismantled two days after the race.[19] The circuit received a mixed response. Lucas di Grassi (Audi) disliked the chicane while Nick Heidfeld (Mahindra) believed the turn would be more challenging than it appeared. Nico Prost of e.Dams-Renault felt that turns four and five would provide a great amount of challenge and it reminded him of the Montreal Street Circuit. However, several drivers raised concerns over the position of the starting grid. Di Grassi argued it should have been placed after turn two while Heidfeld doubted that moving the start line would make any significant difference.[20]

Practice

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.[21] A half an hour untimed shakedown session was held on Friday afternoon to enable teams to check the reliability of their cars and electronic systems.[21] Piquet incurred a suspended three place grid penalty for exceeding the maximum amount of permitted laps (six) during shakedown and a repeat transgression before the session ended would require him to serve it.[22] In the first practice session, held in relatively cold weather, Piquet set the fastest time of 1 minute, 36.134 seconds lap, followed by Bird, Mitch Evans (Jaguar), Vergne, Buemi, Lotterer, Rosenqvist, Jérôme d'Ambrosio (Dragon), di Grassi and Alex Lynn (Virgin).[23] During the session, several drivers were caught out by the track and some including Lotterer ventured onto its run-off areas as they learnt the limits of the track and finding a rhythm they liked.[23] José María López (Dragon) glanced the turn five barrier and damaged his car's rear-right corner. Lynn ended the session five minutes prematurely with a slide at a 45-degree angle into the turn one barrier, deranging his front-left suspension.[24] Rosenqvist led for most of the second session and recorded a 200 kW (270 hp) lap late on of 1 minute, 35.467 seconds. He was three-tenths of a second faster than the second-placed Bird. Di Grassi, López, Prost, Buemi, d'Ambrosio, Piquet, Tom Blomqvist (Andretti) and Evans were in third to tenth.[25] With five minutes left, Lynn crashed for the second time when he lost control of the rear of his car approaching the turn sixteen/seventeen chicane because of an overspeed that sent him into an outside barrier sideways with the left hand side of his vehicle.[25][26] Lynn was unhurt but the crash significantly damaged his car and ended the session early due to the limited amount of available time.[27]

Qualifying

Saturday's afternoon one hour qualifying session 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 all 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.[21]

Felix Rosenqvist (pictured in 2016) took his third pole position of the season and the sixth of his career.

In the first group of five drivers, Blomqvist was the early pace setter and was followed by Maro Engel (Venturi) and Prost.[28] Both Luca Filippi (NIO) and d'Ambrosio set one timed warm-up lap as the duo crossed the timing team after the first group ended due to a mistimed run that prevented them from recording a lap at maximum power.[29][30][31] Rosenqvist immediately went the fastest of anyone in the track's first sector and topped group two.[31] Buemi followed in second with Bird third and Vergne fourth. Piquet struggled with the tight track and was the second group's slowest driver.[28] In the third group, Evans was the fastest competitor and put himself amongst the top five overall runners as he eliminated Vergne from super pole.[31] Di Grassi was second-quickest with Oliver Turvey (NIO) third and Daniel Abt (Audi) fourth.[30] The third group's slowest driver Edoardo Mortara (Venturi) made contact with a wall leaving the Obelisk chicane and broke his rear-left suspension and steering arm, causing him to fight for control of his car for the rest of his lap.[29][30][32]

Before the final group commenced, a miscommunication caused López to be released from his garage at the wrong time and hit the sidepod of António Félix da Costa's Andretti car at low speed. López was consequently pushed into a wall because he could not steer away from Félix da Costa.[32][33] Both cars sustained suspension damage and neither López nor Félix da Costa set a lap time as Formula E regulations obliged teams to nominate one of the driver's two cars for use in qualifying.[30][34] Lotterer surprised all by setting the fastest overall group stage lap of 1 minute, 36.593 seconds by gaining four-tenths of a second in the circuit's final sector after two previous average sector times on its last lap.[28][33] Heidfeld drove tidily on his lap to place second and Lynn was third. At the end of group qualifying, the lap times set by Lotterer, Rosenqvist, Buemi, Bird and Evans qualified them into super pole.[31] Although Rosenqvist glanced a barrier with his right-rear wheel leaving the Obelisk chicane,[35] he took his third pole position of the season and the sixth of his career with a time of 1 minute, 36.311 seconds.[29][31] He was joined on the grid's front row by Bird who had the pole until Rosenqvist's lap.[32] Evans, third, locked his tyres at turn nine, battled for control of his car over the bumps while braking for the turn 13 hairpin.[32][34] Lotterer could not replicate his group qualifying performance due to a lack of tyre cooling and was fourth after losing four-tenths of a second in the first sector. Buemi appeared to win pole by going fastest early on but an error with the retardation of his regenerative system entering turn 13 put him deep after missing his braking point on the bumpy track and started fifth.[31][32][36]

Post-qualifying

Andretti were issued a €10,000 fine as the stewards deemed them to have released Félix da Costa's car "in an unsafe manner and [da Costa] then collided with car number six that was approaching in the fast lane.”[37] Félix da Costa (penalised ten grid positions for the afternoon's race), López, Filippi and d'Ambrosio (also dropped two places on the grid for passing the chequered flag twice) were granted permission by the stewards to start the race.[37] After the application of penalties, the rest of the order consisted of di Grassi, Turvey, Vergne, Abt, Heidfeld, Lynn, Blomqvist, Piquet, Engel, Prost, Mortara, Filippi, d'Ambrosio, López and Félix da Costa[1]

Qualifying classification

Final qualifying classification
Pos. No. Driver Team GS SP Grid
1 19 Sweden Felix Rosenqvist Mahindra 1:36.683 1:36.311 1
2 2 United Kingdom Sam Bird Virgin-Citroën 1:36.901 1:36.987 2
3 20 New Zealand Mitch Evans Jaguar 1:36.911 1.37.199 3
4 18 Germany André Lotterer Techeetah-Renault 1:36.593 1:37.235 4
5 9 Switzerland Sébastien Buemi e.Dams-Renault 1:36.732 1:37.817 5
6 1 Brazil Lucas di Grassi Audi 1:36.973 N/a 6
7 16 United Kingdom Oliver Turvey NIO 1:37.045 N/a 7
8 25 France Jean-Éric Vergne Techeetah-Renault 1:37.055 N/a 8
9 66 Germany Daniel Abt Audi 1:37.117 N/a 9
10 23 Germany Nick Heidfeld Mahindra 1:37.365 N/a 10
11 36 United Kingdom Alex Lynn Virgin-Citroën 1:37.546 N/a 11
12 27 United Kingdom Tom Blomqvist Andretti-BMW 1:37.561 N/a 12
13 3 Brazil Nelson Piquet Jr. Jaguar 1:38.066 N/a 13
14 5 Germany Maro Engel Venturi 1:38.212 N/a 14
15 8 France Nico Prost e.Dams-Renault 1:38.410 N/a 15
16 7 Belgium Jérôme d'Ambrosio Dragon-Penske 1:42.003 N/a 181
17 4 Switzerland Edoardo Mortara Venturi 1:47.802 N/a 16
18 68 Italy Luca Filippi NIO 2:09.829 N/a 172
19 6 Argentina José María López Dragon-Penske N/a 192
20 28 Portugal António Félix da Costa Andretti-BMW N/a 2012
Source:[1]

Notes:

Race

Standings after the race

References

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