Sebastien Buemi soared to a dominant pole position for the penultimate race of the 2018/19 Formula E season in New York City.
The Swiss racer completed his initial qualifying lap in the second group of runners, ending the group qualifying stages as the fastest driver after lapping the 2.373km-long Brooklyn Street Circuit in 1m 10.556s.
Taking the top spot, the Nissan e.dams driver was joined in the Super Pole shootout by Sam Bird, Pascal Wehrlein, Alexander Sims, Alex Lynn and Daniel Abt, with all Group 1 runners getting eliminated from qualifying.
As the slowest driver inside the top six, Audi's Abt opened proceedings, laying down a benchmark 1m 10.894s lap although this was quickly beaten by Lynn who was the second runner, the Jaguar Racing driver bettering the German's lap by 0.198s.
BMW i Andretti Motorsport's Sims was the third runner in the final part of qualifying, however, after making a mistake in the first sector, was unable to challenge Lynn, settling into third overall.
As the fourth runner, Wehrlein powered to the fore by beating Lynn's best lap by 0.096s while Envision Virgin Racing's Bird failed to match the Formula E rookie after struggling for grip in the first sector.
As the final runner, Buemi was the only driver standing between Wehrlein and pole position and when the Season 2 champion completed a 1m 10.188s lap, pole position would go into the hands of the Swiss driver while also securing three bonus points to keep his championship hopes alive.
Outside of Super Pole, Jose Maria Lopez was the best of the rest with the Argentinian driver taking seventh for GEOX Dragon while Antonio Felix da Costa emerged as the highest placed Group 1 driver, qualifying in eighth in the second BMW.
Robin Frijns secured ninth in the second Envision Virgin car while championship leader Jean-Eric Vergne experienced a difficult session, completing the top 10 for DS Techeetah.
Outside of the top 10, Maximilian Gunther was 11th fastest while Tom Dillmann impressed for NIO Formula E, securing 12th for the Oxfordshire-based outfit.
Third-placed championship man Mitch Evans was 13th while Lucas di Grassi was 14th, the Brazilian needing to outscore Vergne by three or more points to keep his title hopes alive.
The first race of the double-header New York City E-Prix will commence later today at 16:00 local time.






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