Da Costa takes another step towards to the title after free practice in Berlin

Antonio Felix Da Costa’s title challenge took a step closer on Sunday morning, as he set the pace in third free practice in Berlin for DS Techeetah on another blisteringly hot day.

With the air temperature already at 28c as the only Sunday practice session started, it was always going to be tricky to keep battery temperatures, drivers and tyres chilled.

The Portuguese driver will win the title if he wins or merely finishes within 7 points of Maximilian Guenther in second place.

Da Costa’s 1:06.319 was enough to edge Guenther’s BMW, with Oliver Rowland setting the third quickest time for Nissan ahead of Mercedes’ Stoffel Vandoorne and Sebastien Buemi in the other Nissan.

Nyck de Vries was sixth fastest in the other Mercedes, followed by Jaguar’s Mitch Evans and Jean-Eric Vergne in the DS Techeetah with the top ten being rounded out by Envision Virgin’s Sam Bird and Lucas di Grassi in the Audi.

Nico Mueller set a very impressive time with a 1:06.666 to go 11th ahead of Alex Lynn in the Mahindra, James Calado in the Jaguar and Edoardo Mortara in the Venturi.

Sergio Sette Camara was 15th quickest for Dragon to go ahead of Envision Virgin’s Robin Frijns and Venturi’s Felipe Massa.

The top 20 was rounded out by Porsche’s Andre Lotterer, Audi’s Rene Rast and Jerome d’Ambrosio in the Mahindra.

Neel Jani was 21st for Porsche ahead of BMW’s Alexander Sims and the NIOs of Daniel Abt and Oliver Turvey.

The session also saw several lockups as many drivers explored the limit on the bumps heading into Turn 6 including, Lotterer, da Costa, Frijns, Massa, Rowland, and d’Ambrosio.