Dennis: Berlin E-Prix podium "felt like a win" after bad run of form

The Briton entered the Berlin double-header second in the standings but had not finished in the points since January following a number of incidents.

Dennis was running towards the front in Saturday’s race at the Tempelhof Airport Street Circuit when he lost control heading into Turn 6 and collected Antonio Felix Da Costa, later blaming a braking issue.

The much-needed result finally came in Sunday’s encounter as Dennis stayed out of trouble and moved into second behind eventual winner Nick Cassidy, shadowing the Envision Racing driver over the remaining 16 laps.

“Ultimately I’m just happy to see the chequered flag, I haven’t seen one since January. It was a bit of a relief to be honest,” said Dennis.

“It was a deep dark place yesterday after the crash with Antonio, I could see the team quite down, it wasn’t a great place, so I needed this for my team.

“We needed it for the championship, not only for myself but the Teams’ championship and it was great to see everyone so happy, it felt like a win for us to be honest after all the bad luck we’ve had.”

Jake Dennis, Andretti Autosport, 2nd position, on the podium

Photo by: Alastair Staley / Motorsport Images

Dennis admitted that although he was able to save energy in the slipstream of Cassidy, the move for the win was never fully on with previous incidents also on his mind.

“I think honestly, Nick made everyone’s lives a lot easier when he hit the front,” he added.

“The pace was decent enough to not cause this big effect of fast-slow for the guys behind.

“I don’t think any of us really had the efficiency to do what he did, that’s why we didn’t pass him and then with eight laps to go the [energy] targets were just too high, the lift points were just too small to go for the move.

“It was just too high risk, especially in my situation where we’ve had four, five DNFs in a row.”

Cassidy’s first win of the season moves him to within four points of championship leader Pascal Wehrlein, after the Porsche driver was only able to finish seventh.

The Kiwi admitted that he didn’t plan to lead for such a long period of time but was left with no other option.

“For a long time, I thought I was in the lead a bit too early, I was planning to drop back, we were having conversations [on the radio] but luckily it worked out,” said Cassidy.