.jpg)
When track action got underway on Saturday morning, Edoardo Mortara’s practice pace was evident and when the Swiss-Italian took to the track for qualifying, he did so with conviction.
Edo was on a charge and by piecing together a 1:06.900 run in Group A, successfully advanced to the duel stages with the third-fastest time.
By first defeating André Lotterer and then Season 6 champion Antonio Felix da Costa in the Quarter and Semi-Finals, Edo progressed to the Final for the third time this season.
In the head-to-head pole position shootout, he was pitted against Alexander Sims and with a storming final sector, vanquished the Mahindra driver by 0.137 seconds.
With this result, Edo secured his very first Formula E pole position and ROKiT Venturi Racing’s first since the 2015 London E-Prix, some 2,512 days earlier.
This set the stage for the first part of the Berlin double-header, and with the starring place on the front row, ambitions were high for Race One.
After finishing second in 2021 and narrowly missing out on the Season 7 title at Tempelhof, Edo had unfinished business in Berlin and raced with calculation and confidence in Race One.
From the front row, he successfully defended the lead and quickly settled into a rhythm to maintain his advantage at the front.
Remaining unchallenged for the first half of the race, Edo activated Attack Mode with 22 minutes remaining but despite falling to second, quickly repassed Lotterer to regain control.
With time waningand pressure mounting from behind, Edo successfully utilised the overcut strategy to his advantage and rejoined in third after his second Attack Mode with an edge over his rivals.
By overtaking both Lotterer and Stoffel Vandoorne in quick succession, Edo assumed the lead once more and extended the gap to take home his fourth win in Formula E to date.
After ending our six-year, 10-month and 16-day pole position drought on Saturday morning, our subsequent wait to take top qualifying honours once more was one of the shortest in Formula E history.
On Sunday, Edo did it again and after continuing to show promise in practice on the clockwise configuration of Tempelhof, he extracted every ounce of performance in qualifying.
Edo set the fastest time in Group B to again progress to the duels and paved his way to the poleposition shootout by beating Nick Cassidy and Nyck de Vries in the head-to-heads.
In the Final, he faced off against Robin Frijns but with a dominant 250kW run, outpaced the Dutchman by 0.498 seconds to secure a second pole position in as many days.
Lining up on the front row, Edo was again in the hot seat for Race Two and was sitting in the prime position to threaten for silverware for the third time in 2022.
Lucas di Grassi’s Saturday at Tempelhof came to an early end but despite suffering from a slow puncture throughout Race One, the Brazilian still posted the fastest lap of the race.
His pace was therefore apparent and on Sunday, Lucas capitalised upon his speed in Group A to advance to the Quarter-Final stages in the fight for pole position.
By qualifying sixth, he lined up on the third row of the grid for Race Two and made a storming start by overtaking da Costa for fifth on the opening lap.
In a strategic drive, Lucas ascended to third and held the podium position for the majority of the race before Stoffel Vandoorne overtook only three minutes away from the chequered flag.
Taking fourth at the race’s close, Lucas scored a crucial 12 points to tip ROKiT Venturi Racing over its 650 all-time points margin in Formula E.
Starting from pole position in Race Two, temperatures were high for Edo and when the race got underway, he managed the heat well by fending off fellow front-row starter Frijns.
A diving move from de Vries into Turn One, however, pushed Edo down to second but after settling into a rhythm, he was soon in hot pursuit.
When de Vries activated his sole use of Attack Mode, Edo briefly regained the lead but byopting to use the overcut strategy, ran longer on race mode than any other top-six driver.
With 28 minutes remaining, Edo saw his chance and activated the power-boost device to rejoin in fifth with an advantage over the field ahead.
By first clearing Lotterer, then Vandoorne and then da Costa, he was back in second place but was, unfortunately, unable to close the gap to the leader, despite posting the fastest lap of the race.
Edo bagged second place when the chequered flag waved and with it, scored a landmark 10th podium finish in Formula E.
This coincided with his 300th point in the series and propelled him into second in the World Drivers’ Championship, scoring 99 points so far this season.
Off the back of a successful weekend in Berlin, we’re already counting down the days for the inaugural Jakarta E-Prix in Indonesia on June 4.
.png)
.png){kind=spacer}
