Fifth stage of the FIA Formula E World Championship was held this Saturday
This Saturday (25) ended the fifth stage of the FIA Formula E World Championship. The competition, which took place on the streets of Cape Town, South Africa, was extremely disputed in one of the most challenging tracks of the nine years of existence of the electric car category. Racing for the Chinese team NIO333 Racing, the Brazilian driver Sérgio Sette Câmara completed the 32 laps of the race in 12th place.
The official weekend activities in Africa began yesterday afternoon with the first free practice session. Coming from a very significant result in India, two weeks ago, Sette and his team arrived excited to follow the evolution started in Hyderabad. Thus, in this Friday practice, Sérgio managed to finish in eighth place by establishing his best lap with a time of 1:10.17. “The track is really fast. Maybe the fastest I’ve ever drove in Formula E. However, there’s something that’s worrying us: the amount of asphalt imperfections (bumps). This, especially in the approach to the corners, is very worrying and can bring us serious problems in the quali and the race,” said the 24-year-old.
This morning the cars returned to the track for their second free practice. As Sette said at the end of the first practicehe and his engineers could not get an ideal match and, with that, he was only with the 15th time in the session, more than a 1.3 seconds from the fastest car. The prognosis was not very good and ended up materializing in the qualifying session when Sérgio made the time of 1m10s083 and was guaranteed only in the 16th position of the starting grid.
Without many features to improve the performance of the car for the race Sette Câmara and its engineers drew a conservative strategy and followed for the race. After a good start the Brazilian driver remained on the track following the guidelines of the team. Faced with a race with some accidents he managed to be constant and, at the end of 32 laps, received the flag in 12th position. The race was won by the Portuguese Antonio Felix da Costa.
“Certainly arriving at 12th is not what we expected. However, unfortunately, it was not possible to do more than that given the conditions of the equipment I had in hand. I’m still adapting to the car, especially in qualifying situation. In the race, facing the track situations, I ended up without vacuum of the cars in front of me and, with that, I drove most of the time alone, without rhythm to attack more opponents. We have exactly one month for the next race, which will be the São Paulo e-Prix. This will be a very special round for me and NIO will certainly do their best to be competitive in my home race. I am very confident in the team’s work and I am sure we will be strong in Brazil’s race”, concluded the pilot from Belo Horizonte.
The sixth stage of the FIA Formula E World Championship will be held on the streets of São Paulo, on March 25, in a track built based on the Sambóromo doAnhembi. Tickets are almost sold out on www.eventim.com.br.
Pictures: NIO333 Racing | Disclosure
Press office of Sérgio Sette Câmara
Responsible journalist: Flávio Quick