Mitch Evans’ stunning drive from 16th on the grid to a fourth place finish in Saturday’s first Tokyo EPrix was in stark contrast to his group qualifying performance when he could do no better than a dejected eighth.
The Kiwi was 0.241s away from making it through to the duel phase of qualifying, which in any other series would have been seen as a close and decent effort. In Formula E it is a lifetime way and it was of significant concern.
“We had no bite from the tyre,” Evans told Formula E Notebook.
“We opted to go for a different tyre strategy, scrubbing the tyre in practice, but quite a heavy scrub. I think it was the wrong approach. Antonio kept new tyres and he found a big peak in the tyre and it just never came.
“So, I think we’ll revise that for tomorrow. In practise, we were P4 in 300kW and not too bad in 350kW, so there was pace in the car. But from the first lap in quali, I just didn’t feel like I had a good peak in the tyre.”
Jaguar team principal, Ian James, said that Evans’ qualifying struggles on Saturday in Tokyo were a key topic that needed addressing. The Kiwi had a poor qualifying period in which he complained consistently of a lack of grip and an inability to use his Hankook tyres to his satisfaction.
“It is something we’ve looked at, and we need to obviously make sure we’ve got our heads around it for tomorrow,” James told FEN. “There’s nothing fundamentally different in the set-up that Antonio had, and obviously he managed to get it through into the duels and then did well.
“I think there was one point where Mitch sort of outbraked himself and cut the corner. Fundamentally, I think we’re OK but we just need to make sure it’s always good, because in Formula E, and these cars in particular, everything’s absolutely spot-on.”
How Evans Burned through the Pack
Building an energy advantage to his rivals was the fundamental key to Evans being able to maximise his late attack mode deployment and scorch through to claim another superb result from a lowly grid position.
It was a very different drive to his wonderous Madrid EPrix performance when he came from the same starting grid position of 16th back in March to claim second, in a race in which he probably should and could have won, had it now been Antonio Felix da Costa leading the race on the final lap.
Evans told FEN on Saturday evening that trying to off-set himself on attack-mode strategy from his rivals ahead was paramount in the first Tokyo EPrix.
“It kind of worked out, and we just had a good energy advantage,” said Evans. “That’s what kind of helped us in the end.
“But twice we lost about three seconds. Once with the Antonio and Pascal incident. Pascal was blocking me like crazy and I lost three seconds on my in-lap. And then another, probably not three seconds, but lost a couple of seconds after that, just trying to clear some guys on attack.
“So, it could have been a better outcome, but I’ll take the P4. I’m pretty happy with that.”
Wet Race lottery forecast
A wet race looks likely at Tokyo Big Sight today, introducing a degree of scattered theory and luck to the prospects of the title protagonists, now led once again by Jaguar’s Mitch Evans.
He overturned a nine point deficit, to head back to his hotel in downtown Tokyo last night with a three point advantage over Pascal Wehrlein, who suffered damage after a. clash with former teammate Antonio Felix da Costa.
Evans told FEN he believed that Sunday’s race was going to be “more hectic” which could ‘go either way” on fortune in the final race before next month’s London EPrix showdown.
“I’ve not forgotten that (it can go either way) and that’s definitely in the front of my mind.,” said Evans, fresh from his stellar run from 16th to fourth on Saturday evening.
“Obviously, I want to try and qualify a bit more towards the front,” he added.
“Tomorrow’s race will be quite intense. But being at the front around a track like here, you have less work to do. We’ll revise what we did today in quali today and also, we’ll see what the weather does. There’s a bit more rain hanging around tomorrow.
Asked whether he was confident in wet conditions, Evans said that “it’s just a flip of a coin, I’ve been dominant, I’ve been way off, so it’s so hard to read.
“Hopefully, we’re on the good side of it, but you just never know on the wet. But I’m feeling good and I think we’ve made a step forward compared to other years. Antonio proved that in quali even in practice, we were top six and top four on 300.kW power, so there’s pace in the car. We’re not the quickest, but we’re strong.”
