Formula E championship leader suffers shock early exit as Jake Dennis seals Jakarta pole

Jake Dennis defeated McLaren's Taylor Barnard in the final duel of qualifying at the Jakarta E-Prix, securing him a first pole position since Berlin last year. 

The Season 9 world champion had been narrowly slower than Barnard through the first two sectors; however, a costly mistake by the McLaren youngster handed Dennis a huge pole.

It marked a major boost for Andretti but also three championship points for Dennis – a reward for securing pole. Nyck de Vries and Nick Cassidy clinched third and fourth on the grid.

It was disaster for Rowland who failed to make the duels by a considerable margin; however, there was a saving grace in that both Porsche factory drivers were also eliminated in the group stage.

Duels

It was an all-British final in Jakarta, with Dennis having not started on pole in an entire year. Through sector one and Barnard had a small advantage of just 0.025s.

However, the two-time FE pole sitter handed his fellow compatriot pole after a mistake in the final corners. 

Despite this, Dennis' lap time of a 1m 06.713 was very impressive, at a circuit where overtaking is expected to be extremely difficult, especially with a threat of rain.

To reach the final, Barnard first defeated Dan Ticktum by a marginal five-thousandths of a second in the quarter-finals, before going quicker than De Vries in the semi-finals.

As for Dennis, he knocked-out Edoardo Mortara in the quarter-finals and Cassidy in the semi-finals. In the other two quarter-finals, Cassidy defeated Jean-Eric Vergne, whilst de Vries eliminated Sebastien Buemi.

Group stage

As qualifying got underway, the circuit in Jakarta remained incredibly dusty, whilst some wet patches were visible due to earlier rain.

It meant the lap times improved by each lap, making it somewhat of a race to be last to start a final qualifying lap for the best of the circuit. 

The opening group featured championship leader Rowland and third-placed da Antonio Felix da Costa, both of which suffered a shock exit in the group stage. 

Both struggled for pace, leaving da Costa on the fifth row and Rowland all the way back on the ninth row. It is a huge blow, with Jakarta not being a peloton race, meanng qualifying is important.

Vergne topped the group with a 1m 09.460, and was joined by Dennis, Mortara and Cassidy. The exit of Rowland opened the door to Pascal Wehrlein and Barnard in the second group.

Wehrlein joined his Porsche team-mate and Rowland in failing to make the duels, with him to also visit the stewards for driving "unnecessarily slowly". 

Barnard, on the other hand, went fastest in the second group after setting a 1m 08.968. He was joined in the top four by de Vries, Buemi and Ticktum.