Yesterday was the final day of open public testing for Formula E. As many as 5,000 fans turned up to the free event at Donington Park circuit to watch the teams ahead of the inaugural race in Beijing, in less than a month’s time.
Sebastian Buemi has once again topped the time sheets, for the fourth out of five free test sessions. His lap time of 1:31.792 was the quickest by far, with second place (Nicolas Prost) coming in more than three car lengths later. Buemi said:
“We’re really happy with today, especially being the last test before Beijing. We still have a few issues with the car which we need to work on and also to better understand the limits of the car. Overall we’re feeling good for the first race but we’ll have to wait and see, a lot of teams are also looking quick.”
The event concludes the free to attend test sessions at Donington Park and with it a boost of confidence for the e.dams-Renault team who clearly lead going into the first race. Of course, Beijing will be a new track to all the drivers, levelling the playing field, whereas Donington Park has seen visits by many of the Formula E paddock in years gone by.
Also of interest at the event was the test debut of Chinese racer Ho-Pin Tung who had previously driven the Spark-Renault SRT_01E earlier in the year. Tung raced alongside Antonio Garcia in the China Racing cars, who are still the only team yet to officially announce their driver line-up.
Finally, the day also saw more new vehicles on test in the shape of the BMW i8 and i3. Both were evaluated as official safety, medical and extraction cars. Furthermore, Qualcomm’s Halo wireless charging technology was confirmed as playing a role in the recharging of the course cars for the Formula E series.
Full race time results of the day are below (combined times):
- Sebastien Buemi, e.dams-Renault, 1:31.792s
- Nicolas Prost, e.dams-Renault, 1:32.117s
- Franck Montagny, Andretti Autosport, 1:32.143s
- Bruno Senna, Mahindra Racing, 1:32.249
- Sam Bird, Virgin Racing, 1:32.292s
- Lucas di Grassi, Audi Sport ABT, 1:32.293s
- Karun Chandhok, Mahindra Racing, 1:32.369s
- Jerome d’Ambrosio, Dragon Racing, 1:32.646s
- Stephane Sarrazin, Venturi, 1:32.663s
- Nick Heidfeld, Venturi, 1:32.775s
- Nelson Piquet, China Racing, 1:32.808s
- Jaime Alguersuari, Virgin Racing, 1:32.821s
- Charles Pic, Andretti Autosport, 1:32.841s
- Daniel Abt, Audi Sport ABT, 1:32.867s
- Jarno Trulli, Trulli, 1:32.892s
- Oriol Servia, Dragon Racing, 1:33.411s
- Antonio Garcia, China Racing, 1:33.469s
- Takuma Sato, Amlin Aguri, 1:35.425s
- Michela Cerruti, Trulli, 1:35.444s
- Katherine Legge, Amlin Aguri, 1:38.112s
Source; FIA Formula E
