Porsche was able to build on its strength at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in the Mexican E-Prix, but had to settle for second and third place after dominating qualifying. Oliver Rowland celebrated his fourth Formula E win.
With Oliver Rowland’s fourth victory in the electric formula in Mexico, second-placed Antonio Felix da Costa was able to take the championship lead. Starting from the 1st row of Pascal Wehrlein (sorry as in São Paulo) and da Costa, everything looked like a fifth victory for Porsche at an altitude of 2200 meters. But the Brit from Yorkshire, who was already strong last year and in the opening in December, he had a better ending for him – because he saved his last addition thanks to the last attack mode and finally in the half round there were three. the champions – Jake Dennis (Andretti-Porsche), Wehrlein and da Costa – were able to pass.
“Victory in this beautiful atmosphere in front of 40,000 fans makes me very happy. I was momentarily disappointed with our tactics because the safety car came onto the track when I first activated attack mode. “But luckily I had a minute of extra power at the end,” explained Rowland. While celebrating his superb performance, the Yorkshireman did not forget to offer words of encouragement to his performance engineer Asier Sebastian, who had to be taken to hospital that morning with acute appendicitis.
“I thought we could win this today. But then the safety car came and crashed our party,” da Costa said with mixed feelings, but also added: “Podium twice! And second after São Paulo, I’m happy!”
Wehrlein, who showed no signs of the consequences of his fatal crash in Brazil in qualifying and the race, was also very emotional: “On the one hand, we really could have won, but on the other hand, I’m winning.” happy that they fought back like this after São Paulo. On top of that, with a newly built car, I have to thank the team for that.”
For Porsche customer Andretti, Mexico brought relief after two early disappearances: Dennis missed the podium in fourth place, but got an extra point for the fastest lap. And Nico Müller came in ninth and got his first points in the new environment. David Beckmann was at Kiro-Porsche for a long time and had a top 10 finish before he retired after contact with Zane Maloney at Abt-Lola, which triggered the deployment of the safety car. “I had a strong tire at the end. The contact was actually a little bit, but it was enough for my race to end,” said the young German.
Max Günther scored his first points of the season in sixth place, just behind DS Penske teammate Jean-Éric Vergne. “Despite the tire wear, it was a good weekend for us. I’m happy with our pace in qualifying and the race and also how my relationship with the team is progressing. “I feel better and better in the car after only two races,” explained the Allgäu native.
The Jaguar drivers suffered a disaster: all the winners of São Paulo, Mitch Evans (suspended) and Nick Cassidy (12th) as well as the Envision Jaguars of Robin Frijns (11th) and Sébastien Buemi (17th) remained without any points.
The Formula E World Championship continues on February 14 and 15 with the first double weekend and the first show at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit. Da Costa (37) travels there twelve points ahead of Evans and Rowland and 16 points ahead of his colleague Wehrlein. Porsche also leads the team and manufacturer standings.
