Sam Bird says that his drive through the field at the Monaco ePrix was one of the best performances of his career, despite being forced to retire.
The British driver started fourteenth but while many others struggled to overtake on the tight Monaco track, Bird was able to pull off several brilliant overtakes on his way up to sixth place.
That included several late braking moves into turn one on Alex Lynn, Stoffel Vandoorne and Antonio Felix da Costa, and a brilliant move on former champion Lucas di Grassi around the outside of turn three.
Unfortunately there was no reward for Bird’s efforts after he was hit behind by Mitch Evans on the very final lap.
The damage caused a puncture which saw his Envision Virgin Racing car pull up just before the finish line.
Speaking afterwards Bird said, “After a disappointing qualifying, we had one of the best Formula E races of my career with some great overtakes, strong race pace, as well as battery management.
“It’s so frustrating it ended up the way it did, and I feel for the team to come away with no points after all that hard work.
“That’s racing though and we know on another day it would have been a different story.”
His team-mate Robin Frijns has been leading the driver’s championship going into the weekend, but he too was left without any points after he failed to finish.
An ambitious move up the inside of Alexander Sims led to contact between the two, with Frijns wrecking his front suspension.
To rub salt into the wound Frijns was also handed a five place grid penalty at the next race as a result of the incident.
“That was a really disappointing result for us and the team, especially after the success of Paris,” Frijns said.
“We had the pace and were on course for a points finish but it wasn’t to be. The team put in so much effort so it’s also a difficult result for them.”
