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ABT CUPRA followed up its recent strong performances in Jakarta by also scoring points on its race debut in Indonesia: Robin Frijns claimed his first points in a race of the current season with a hard-fought ninth place on Saturday, while teammate Nico Müller narrowly missed out on further points with eleventh place. In Sunday’s race, which was also held in oppressively hot temperatures, both drivers of the newly formed team showed an impressive race to catch up, but remained without any countable reward.
Robin Frijns put the first exclamation mark on the weekend in the metropolis of eleven million people on Saturday morning when he finished in the top four of his qualifying group, making it into the duel phase for the second time this season and starting from seventh place. Nico Müller qualified just one row behind in ninth place. In the race, the duo stayed out of all the trouble and recorded the best result of the season so far for ABT CUPRA. After a difficult qualifying session on Sunday, Müller and Frijns showed a strong race from grid positions 17 and 22 to finish 12th and 13th.
“Many thanks for the efforts of the whole team, who worked hard under difficult conditions and always kept a cool head,” said Team Principal Thomas Biermaier. “Saturday we made it through to the duels in qualifying and scored points from our own steam in the race – that was strong! But for us to achieve something like that, it takes a perfect lap in qualifying and also a perfect day in other respects, which we weren’t able to repeat on Sunday. The reality is that there is still a lot of work ahead of us before we can consistently fight in the midfield.” On both Saturday and Sunday, ABT CUPRA provided the fastest of the four cars equipped with Mahindra Racing powertrains.
“These were two very tough races physically, where we had to go to our physical limits,” says Robin Frijns. “We made small steps forward here as well, even if you can hardly see them in the results. We are moving in the right direction and will not let up in the final third of the season. Portland is completely new territory for all the teams and drivers, so we’re all starting with a blank sheet of paper.”
“My first weekend with Formula E in Jakarta was hot, sporty and physically a real challenge, but also a great experience – especially with these enthusiastic fans,” says Nico Müller. “On Saturday, I almost made it into the duel phase of qualifying and, with a slightly more clever strategy, might have been able to also score points in the race. Sunday we came back to the hard ground of reality and were clearly reminded that we have to fight hard for every single point with the current package.”
The double-header in Jakarta also marks the end of the ABT Motorsport weeks: the team from Kempten competed in four different categories on five consecutive weekends: at Formula E in Monaco, at Extreme E in Scotland, at the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring, at the DTM season opener in Oschersleben and now at Formula E in Indonesia. After a short break, the last weekend in June sees a double event on the ABT calendar: Formula E starts for the first time in Portland in the US state of Oregon, while the DTM returns to the dune circuit at Zandvoort in the Netherlands.
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