Magnificent qualifying pace and another points finish in Tokyo
The ERT Formula E Team showed great pace at the Tokyo E-Prix, with Sérgio Sette Câmara qualifying in fourth, matching his season’s best after getting all the way to the qualifying semi-finals before going on to secure a top ten finish, scoring key points in the teams’ championship.
The ABB FIA Formula E World Championship was racing in Japan for the first time, and was welcomed by an enthusiastic Japanese crowd in the vibrant capital.
ERT’s drivers Sette Câmara and Dan Ticktum took a cautious approach to the two practice sessions, with the first one quite damp after rainfall earlier on Friday, and with no full power runs in the sessions, they didn’t show their true pace until qualifying.
The team’s drivers were both in the second qualifying group based on their championship position, and were improving on their first banker runs in the final moments of the session. Ticktum struggled for grip on his second set of tyres and just missed out on getting through to the duels by two-tenths of a second, while Sette Câmara stormed through, setting the second fastest time just a tenth of a second down on the leader.
Sette Câmara then easily won his first duel by over half a second on his rival, before his semi-final run was hampered after his car was unsettled when he hit the jump at Turn 3 and tapped the wall. He finished the lap but with damage, qualifying an impressive fourth.
At the start of the E-Prix in the afternoon, Sette Câmara lost one spot after the lights went out, while Ticktum dropped two places to 17th, and from there on the battle was to maintain track position and capitalise on any mistakes up front.
Sette Câmara was defending well whilst running with an aggressive group up front, though by lap five he had now settled into eighth position.
Ticktum opted to take both his Attack Mode deployments early without losing track position, with the plan to maximise on any late-race safety cars.
Sette Câmara then took his first Attack Mode on lap 17, falling to tenth, just before the first and only safety car was called when the driver just ahead of him was involved in a collision, which the Brazilian was fortunate to avoid.
In the final phase of the race Sette Câmara was able to complete a steady run to finish the race in tenth position, increasing his points tally for the season, while Ticktum had backed off to conserve energy and finished the race in 18th.
The team therefore finishes the race weekend on a positive note, with both cars making the finish, and with more points scored by Sette Câmara in front of a fantastic atmosphere for the championship’s Japan debut.
The team now turns its attention to the first European round of the season in two weeks’ time at the Misano circuit in Italy.
Sérgio Sette Câmara #3
I’m happy with the race. Of course you want to stay where you qualify, or even go forward, but of course we finished in P10, so from the outside maybe it looked like a bad race and we lost positions, but we know it’s very easy to end up out of the points with our powertrain efficiency, so the fact we stayed in the points is reason to celebrate.
I’m so happy about qualifying, for me that P4 felt really good. We’ve matched our season’s best qualifying result with fourth, and with P9 in the race we have reasons to be happy. We were able to make the most out of the package this weekend, and now we’ll focus on the next race.
Dan Ticktum #33
We had a lot of potential in qualifying, but we got the tyres wrong which was very disappointing. In the race, it was the same story really, we had nothing to fight with and no efficiency, our one-lap pace was there but we just got the tyres in the wrong window.”
Russell O'Hagan - Chief Operations Officer / Deputy Team Principal
A hectic but rewarding weekend where our strong qualifying pace allowed us to score our second points finish of the season. A big thanks to the team and drivers for their efforts and to Formula E and the city of Tokyo for an incredible event!”