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Dennis closes in on championship lead with London victory

Jake Dennis dominates the opening race in London to move into second in the Formula E championship standings.

Dennis swept past pole-sitter Alex Lynn as the Mahindra driver took Attack Mode and was untouchable throughout the remainder of the race.

He moves to within two points of the championship lead as points leader Sam Bird retired at the end of lap 1.

Dennis stuck with Lynn through the first half of the race. The pair broke away from the rest of the field, but Dennis was confident he had a stronger pace than Lynn and was being held up.

The two activated their first Attack Modes simultaneously, but Lynn chose to go through the activation zone again soon after his first power boost finished. Dennis stayed on the racing line and swept past the pole sitter.

The BMW driver was able to show the stronger pace he had told his engineer he had, though wear on the rear tyres was a concern. He gradually edged out a lead over Lynn, helped when the Mahindra driver made a small lock up.

By the time Dennis took his second Attack Mode, he was out of reach of Lynn, who was locked in a battle with Sebastien Buemi and Nyck de Vries.

Dennis finished a comfortable 5.341s ahead of the battle for second to take his second win of the season.

De Vries took second after a strong climb up through the order. He was running eighth by the end of the opening lap but took advantage of a battle between Lucas Di Grassi and Sergio Sette Camara to climb up to fifth and onto the tail of Andre Lotterer.

Buemi, Lotterer and de Vries ran nose to tail and the Mercedes driver took fourth from Lotterer as the Porsche driver attempted to activate attack mode. Lotterer hadn’t managed to activate the extra power mode, though, and was stuck behind de Vries without the extra energy.

De Vries climbed onto the podium after Buemi ran off-line to try to attack Lynn ahead, then swept past Lynn with the assistance of FanBoost. He moves into third in the championship standings.

Lynn held off Buemi to complete the podium.

It was a disastrous maiden home E-Prix for Jaguar.

Mitch Evans made contact with Alexander Sims on the opening lap after Sims was shuffled wide. Evans was left with damage to his nose while Sims retired from the race. After a trip to the pits for a new front wing, Evans was at the back of the field and made up little progress to finish P17, though he did set the fastest lap of the race.

Sam Bird was also caught out as the pack bunched up on the opening lap, and he came into the pits with damage early on. It was the end of his race, as he was unable to get back out, and his championship lead was drastically cut down.

Andre Lotterer managed to hold off the Audi duo of Rene Rast and Di Grassi to take fifth. Rast enjoyed a strong climb up through the order after a difficult qualifying and kept the pressure on Lotterer for much of the second half of the race. Di Grassi was briefly allowed through to try to challenge the Porsche driver, but Lotterer held firm.

De Vries’ Mercedes team-mate had an equally interesting race. After an issue in FP2, Stoffel Vandoorne struggled in qualifying and started at the tail end of the field. He climbed up to P8 by the chequered flag, ending the race just ahead of Antonio Felix Da Costa and Oliver Rowland.

Bethonie Waring

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