Norman Nato secured his first pole position in Formula E, defeating Jake Dennis in the final of the qualifying Duels for the Miami E-Prix at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
The Nissan driver set a time of 1m23.037s in the final, 0.129s quicker than Andretti's Dennis who'd made the final for the first time since the Berlin E-Prix last season.
Nato's route to the final began with a first place in the second Group session, before he beat Lucas di Grassi – who took Lola into the Duels for the very first time – and Robin Frijns in his first two head-to-heads.
Dennis, meanwhile, also finished third in his Group, then beat Vandoorne in his Quarter Final Duel – with the fastest lap of the day, a 1m23.000s – then knocked out Antonio Felix da Costa in his Semifinal, recovering from a less-than-ideal start to the lap to edge him by 0.022s.
A first time polesitter – which also gave Nato his first three points of the season – and a return to form for Dennis and his Andretti team weren't the only big talking points in qualifying. A number of big names failed to make the head-to-head stage at all.
Neither Jaguar of Mitch Evans or Nick Cassidy advanced, them finishing seventh in their respective groups, while championship leader Oliver Rowland fell in the first group after finishing eighth and NEOM McLaren’s Taylor Barnard dropped out from the second group after suffering a snap of oversteer going into Turn 1 and then having a scrappy final sector on his last fast lap.
Reigning champion Pascal Wehrlein also dropped out from the second group after finishing fifth. His teammate da Costa topped the opening group, while a late charge from Robin Frijns put him top of Group B.
Behind the front row of Nato and Dennis, da Costa will line up third alongside Frijns, with Nyck de Vries in fifth, Stoffel Vandoorne sixth, di Grassi seventh, and David Beckmann eighth, after he made the Duels for the first time.
Wehrlein will start ninth with Edoardo Mortara 10th, Barnard 11th, and Sebastien Buemi 12th. Cassidy and Evans make up an all-Jaguar row 7, with Dan Ticktum and Rowland behind them in 15th and 16th.
Jean-Eric Vergne, Nico Mueller, Sam Bird, Zane Maloney, Maximilian Guenther, and Jake Hughes complete the grid.
