Nick Cassidy recovered from missing final practice to secure pole position for the Formula E season finale in London after defeating Maximilian Günther in the final duel.
Cassidy missed FP3 due to a brake by wire failure but bounced back in qualifying to secure pole. Claiming pole has seen Cassidy reduce his deficit to Pascal Wehrlein in the championship to just four points.
Just four points splits the top three in the standings ahead of this evening's last race of the season. Championship leader Wehrlein will start in fourth and is joined on the second row by the third title contender, Mitch Evans.
In a crucial blow for Porsche, Antonio Felix da Costa failed to progress to the duels and starts the season finale from P10.
From fifth to eighth on the grid are Robin Frijns, Jean-Eric Vergne, Stoffel Vandoorne and Sam Bird.
Group stage
The opening group of the final qualifying session of the season included new championship leader Wehrlein and ex-leader Cassidy. In a challenge for Wehrlein, three Jaguar-powered cars featured in Group A.
Mid-session in the first group and it was a Nissan powertrain one-two, as Oliver Rowland and McLaren's Jake Hughes sat in first and second. Wehrlein was third ahead of Sacha Fenestraz in fourth, whilst Cassidy needed a better lap as he found himself in fifth.
Delivering a better lap is exactly what Cassidy did, as he topped Group A to progress to the duels. He hailed his duels lap as the "best job I've done in my Formula E career", whilst Wehrlein secured second. Bird and Frijns also progressed to the duels.
With Cassidy and Wehrlein having safely progressed to the duels, the pressure was on Evans in Group B to join his fellow title rivals. Wehrlein's team-mate – da Costa – also featured in the second group.
Season 8 world champion Vandoorne led the group after the opening hot laps, ahead of da Costa, Sette Camara and Lucas di Grassi. Just like Cassidy in the first group, Evans was fifth and in need of a big improvement in the closing minutes.
Evans improved on his penultimate hot lap to seal an all-important place in the duel spots, as his time was enough to end the group as second quickest. Günther set the pace and ended Group B on top, whilst DS Penske duo Vandoorne and Vergne completed the top four.
Duels
In the opening duel of the final qualifying of the season, championship leader Wehrlein went up against Bird. Wehrlein defeated the Briton with ease after setting a 1:10.216, to progress to the semi finals.
The second quarter-final duel was an all-Jaguar powertrain affair as Cassidy battled Frijns. Cassidy narrowly defeated Frijns by one-tenth but almost crashed after taking a significant amount of the Turn 10 kerb.
Wehrlein and Cassidy making the semi finals once again put the pressure on Evans in the next duel. However, the Jaguar driver survived the pressure to defeat Vandoorne, courtesy of a 1:10.200.
An all Stellantis-powertrain duel was the most exciting of the quarter finals, as Maserati's Günther defeated his rumoured 2025 team-mate Vergne by just 0.074s.
Into the business end of the duels and the opening semi-final was a titanic one, as championship leader Wehrlein went against third-placed Cassidy. Worryingly, the latter was warned of a possible brake by wire issue ahead of his lap – he missed FP3 due to the same problem.
Thankfully, Cassidy avoided the problem and set a strong 1:10.263 to defeat Wehrlein by nearly two tenths of a second.
Yet again, this put pressure on Evans in the second semi-final against Günther. A slow first sector cost Evans big time, as he was slower than Günther by 0.046s and eliminated.
The final duel of the 2023/24 season was Cassidy's big chance to reduce his deficit in the title fight. He was 0.003s faster than Günther halfway round the ExCeL Centre circuit but extended his advantage in the final sector to 0.169s.
He saved the fastest time of the weekend to the last qualifying lap of the weekend, with his 1:09.871 having secured a vital pole in the title fight.
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