Mitch Evans continued his domination of this weekend’s Rome E-Prix, after topping free practice 3 Sunday morning.
Yesterday’s race winner topped a fourth consecutive session in the Italian capital in FP3 after setting the quickest lap time of the weekend so far, ahead of Buemi and Maximilian Günther.
Following on from Saturday’s huge high-speed six-car crash on the exit of Turn 6, all the damaged cars were brilliantly repaired in time for FP3. Several spare chassis’ were used overnight, due to just how damaged several cars were.
René Rast was the early pacesetter on Sunday morning and topped the session as it entered its second half, with the opening 15 minutes having been fairly uneventful. A yellow flag was flown though with just over 13 minutes remaining, after Lucas di Grassi came to a halt.
The Brazilian did eventually get going again, only for his team-mate Roberto Merhi to lock-up and go off the circuit in the final sector. Günther displaced Rast at the top of the timesheets as the session entered its final 10 minutes, before race one winner Evans went almost seven-tenths clear.
Evans topped the session with four minutes remaining from Nick Cassidy and Günther, the two drivers who interestingly joined the Jaguar driver on the podium yesterday.
Jake Dennis and Pascal Wehrlein then broke into the top three in second and third, with Dennis’ time having still been two-tenths slower than Evans’. Buemi, though, then hit the front on a very quick 1:37.663, to go 0.061s faster than the race one winner.
Several strong times were set as the chequered flag was flown, as Evans reclaimed the top spot once again with a 1:37.561 – the fastest lap time of the double-header so far. The Kiwi finished as the leading driver for the fourth consecutive session this weekend at the Circuito Cittadino dell’EUR, just over a tenth ahead of Buemi.
Günther’s final lap was identical to the Swiss driver’s quickest time, putting the German in third ahead of António Félix da Costa and championship leader Cassidy. Dennis finished sixth ahead of Dan Ticktum, Wehrlein, Sam Bird and Sérgio Sette Câmara, completing the top 10.
Yesterday’s 10th place finisher Sacha Fenestraz failed to set a lap time, due to a suspected battery-related issue.
The next session in the Eternal City will be qualifying for the 14th race of the 2022/23 Formula E season, which is set to commence at 09:40 GMT.
