Track limits mess causes FE delay and bizarre ‘solo’ duel

Multiple laptime deletions for track limits offences caused confusion and a delay in Hyderabad Formula E qualifying, and led to the bizarre sight of Jean-Eric Vergne conducting a solo duel.

Vergne, progressing through the semi-finals unopposed, went on to narrowly miss out on pole position to Jaguar’s Mitch Evans in the final.

The potential for track limits breaches at the first chicane to cause controversy had been clear going into the weekend.

The chicane was a late addition to the track layout to give more opportunity for energy regeneration and to slow the cars into the following hairpin.

But the organisers ran out of time to install full kerbs there, so formed the chicane mostly using painted lines with an automated track limits monitoring system.

Three of the eight cars involved in the quarter-finals stage of the qualifying duels then fell foul of the track limits rule there – including both participants in quarter-final four, Rene Rast and Edoardo Mortara.

Sam Bird also had his lap deleted after beating Vergne in quarter-final three.

That meant Vergne went through to the semis, but had no opponent there as neither Rast nor Mortara were allowed to progress. Vergne simply had to set a legal laptime to reach the final.

Qualifying was delayed while the officials worked through checks on the laps and what the procedure should be in the event of both cars in a duel losing their laptimes.

The frustrated Bird said the way the chicane lines had been painted made it almost impossible to reliably stay within the track limits.

“The way that they’ve positioned it, the car’s going one way and they’ve painted a line that goes the other way. So, at some point, everybody’s going to be crossing over there,” he said.

“It’s more luck than judgment. I think it’s very very harsh, I don’t particularly agree with it.

“We asked for different solutions and this is the solution they’ve come up with. For me, we could’ve done a better job, solution-wise.

“Really a big shame because I’ve been pretty much the fastest all weekend so far. So, to be quickest and to have it taken away is gutting.

“If you watch the replays, the car is going one way, the track is going the other. It’s a matter of luck, to be honest.”

Bird, Mortara and Rast end up sixth, seventh and eighth on the grid after their lap deletions.

Rast’s duel lap deletion was McLaren’s second costly one in the session. His team-mate Jake Hughes had been fastest in the first qualifying group but had his two best times deleted because he hadn’t respected the minimum pitstop time of 100 seconds during his mid-session pit visit.

That rule is in place to control costs by preventing teams from needing equipment for rapid wheel changes. McLaren said the transgression was a team error. Hughes starts 21st.

Evans’ pole is Jaguar’s first of the Gen3 era, with Vergne’s second place marking a significant upturn in DS Penske’s form – though his reigning champion team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne struggled to 17th.

Jaguar also has customer team Envision third on the grid with Sebastien Buemi, alongside Nissan rookie Sacha Fenestraz. Maximilian Guenther completes the top five for Maserati.

Porsche returned to the track on Saturday after pulling its cars from Friday practice following Pascal Wehrlein’s big early crash.

Wehrlein was passed fit to continue in the weekend following hospital checks.

The cause of the practice accident remains unknown, though Porsche is now investigating an issue around the car’s vehicle control unit data collector with the FIA.

None of the Porsche runners made the duels, with Wehrlein initially best of them in ninth – the position he won from in the Diriyah opener last month.

But his task then became slightly harder when he was given a three-place penalty for an impeding incident with NIO 333’s Sergio Sette Camara during group qualifying.

As well as the delay while the duels situation was being resolved, qualifying was also held up by a group B red flag when Kelvin van der Linde had another episode of his Abt Cupra failing to slow after similar problems in Friday’s shakedown. He went down an escape road and had a relatively light impact with the tyre wall at the end.

Qualifying Results