Hong Kong Formula E: Vandoorne takes first pole for HWA, Rowland P2

Vandoorne was the last runner in superpole as both he and his team-mate Gary Paffett made the top six cut-off by topping the group running.

Oliver Rowland had placed his Nissan e.dams car on provisional pole with a 1m11.903s lap and had looked set to hold onto the position when Vandoorne went slightly deep into the Turn 1 hairpin on his superpole run.

But Vandoorne recovered with a stunning final sector to seal pole by 0.323s. That meant Rowland held onto second place ahead of Venturi's Edoardo Mortara.

But Mortara will not keep his third place after he was given a three-place grid drop for speeding under a red flag during the group running.

That red flag was caused by reigning champion Jean-Eric Vergne during the second group segment, where he lost control of the rear of his DS Techeetah car at the end of his fast lap and collided with the wall just after he had set a time that was then good enough for fourth.

Vergne was subsequently shuffled down the order and was later penalised for causing the red flag, which meant his best time was deleted and he was demoted to 18th in the final order.

In the other Techeetah-run car, Andre Lotterer ended superpole in fourth place, but will start third thanks to Mortara's penalty, just ahead of Paffett.

Both Lucas di Grassi and Sam Bird impressed to qualify fifth and seventh despite having the first-on-the-road disadvantage of running in group one.

Sebastien Buemi could not make it out of group three alongside Rowland, and he ended up eighth behind Bird.

Felipe Massa (Venturi) finished ninth after running wide at Turn 1 during his flying lap in group three, but it proved to be enough to hold off practice pacesetter Robin Frijns, who took 10th.

NIO's Tom Dillmann and Dragon Racing duo Felipe Nasr and Jose Maria Lopez had the advantage of being in group four - when the track was at its driest following a pre-session rain shower, with another bout of heavy rain later delaying superpole by five minutes - but they failed to make an impression on the leading times.

Dillmann qualified in 11th, with Lopez in 14th and ex-F1 driver Nasr in 16th.

At the tail end of the order, the group one disadvantage caught out BMW Andretti's Antonio Felix da Costa and the Mahindra Racing pair Pascal Wehrlein and Jerome D'Ambrosio.

The trio qualified in the last three spots on the grid, with da Costa heading Wehrlein and current championship leader D'Ambrosio.

Provisional starting grid