Following a challenging double-header in Berlin, Jake Hughes bounced back with a bang at the Monaco E-Prix last weekend, with the rookie having claimed his second pole position of the season.
Hughes’ qualifying pace has been one of his key strengths so far this year in the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship, with his one lap pace performance having been on display yet again at the Circuit de Monaco. The Briton progressed to the Final stage of the duels fairly comfortably; however, he made a huge error on his lap for pole.
The NEOM McLaren Formula E Team driver saw his time invalidated after locking-up and cutting across the Nouvelle Chicane, handing pole to Sacha Fenestraz. However, Hughes was later awarded pole position and the three points that come with it after it was discovered that his fellow rookie had used too much power on his pole lap, resulting in his time also being deleted. It was a confusing situation which took awhile to sort; however, Hughes was granted pole.
He made a strong start to the race and led the opening laps; however, he ultimately didn’t have the pace to fend off the title favourites, who quickly worked their way to the front. Hughes was also overtaken by Fenestraz late on, leaving the Briton to finish fifth for the third time this year.
With it being Monaco, Hughes was “disappointed” to have not even claimed a podium, although, he did recognise that the Woking-based team made a good step forward.
“Overall, it’s a strong result for the team, finishing P5 to get the points in Monaco. You’ll always be disappointed if you qualify on Pole and then can’t finish it off in the race with a podium, but we’ve secured three valuable points from today’s qualifying session too. The racing we are seeing at the moment is competitive and aggressive so surviving the race alone is a positive.
“We now move on to Jakarta where we’ll be looking to be as strong as we have been this weekend in Monaco.”
“We were unfortunate with how things turned out” – René Rast
On the other side of the McLaren garage and it was another disappointing weekend for René Rast, who also endured a bit of a nightmare in Berlin. The German was unable to bounce back in the manner in which his team-mate did, with Rast having only salvaged fourteenth in qualifying.
The race didn’t go much better for the McLaren driver, who was involved in a collision with André Lotterer early on, putting the Avalanche Andretti Formula E driver out of the race. Rast ultimately couldn’t make enough progress to get into the points, with him having eventually crossed the line in seventeenth at The Principality.
Rast openly admitted after the race that it simply “wasn’t my day”, with the German now looking to figure out what he can improve on ahead of next month’s all-important Jakarta double-header.
“It wasn’t my day today. I missed pace in qualifying, resulting in my starting position being in the midfield which was disappointing. I tried to save a lot of energy at the start of the race but with everything going on around me it made things difficult. Before the race, we were confident to get a top 10 finish, but we were unfortunate with how things turned out on track today. As a team we will work hard and turn our focus onto the double-header in Jakarta.”
