Mitch Evans took his first race win of the 2022/23 Formula E World Championship in an eventful race that saw both Jaguar cars and their customer team Envision lock out the podium in Sao Paulo.
After struggling with poor luck and their cars colliding with one another in previous races, Jaguar’s fortunes changed, as Evans’s team-mate Sam Bird rounded out the podium in third place.
Meanwhile, Envision Racing’s Nick Cassidy fought hard at the front to claim another podium for the team.
Chaos ensued on the opening lap of the race into the first heavy braking section of the track. The slow-speed series of corners bunched the pack up and caused collisions aplenty.
Norman Nato came out of the melee worst in his Nissan, making contact with Jake Hughes and the damage causing him to limp home and retire the car.
Amongst the chaos, Edoardo Mortara made contact with Mitch Evans. He lost control of his Maserati going into turn three, forcing him into the run-off and dropping down plenty of positions.
Stoffel Vandoorne protected his lead well in the opening laps, spending energy in the process. He took attack mode on lap five and lost first place to Antonio Felix Da Costa behind him.
Looking to recoup some energy in the tow behind Da Costa, Vandoorne claimed the lead back two laps later, taking the Porsche on the straight with little fight from the Portuguese driver.
Leading the race was not preferable to the drivers early on, with the tow being incredibly powerful due to the long straights on the track,
While the opening laps of the race were eventful, the first safety car of the race didn’t come until lap 8 when Sacha Fenestraz stopped on track with an electrical failure in what became a double DNF for Nissan.
Da Costa had a fantastic restart after the first safety car, making up two places on the first green-flagged lap.
Overtakes for the lead were plenty, as energy strategy came into play on the straights, with drivers lifting and coasting in order to save power.
It wasn’t long before the safety car came back out, with yet more carnage through the slow-speed section of corners at the end of the start/finish straight.
This time it was Jake Dennis coming to a halt after contact from Dan Ticktum behind sent him into Pascal Wehrlein, puncturing his rear tyre and breaking his drive shaft.
Race director Scott Elkins extended the safety car period in order to collect the large amounts of debris on the track from several collisions.
After swapping the lead for much of the race, Da Costa lost the win for good when he locked up into turn one and had to wait in the run-off to rejoin the track and not get penalised for any gained advantage.
Pascal Wehrlein started taking his attack mode very late on, saving all of the extra energy for a late charge through the field. However, being surrounded by Jaguar power played in their favour, as they were able to block the German driver from another podium.
During the four added laps, Da Costa continued to recover the positions he lost and fought up to fourth come to the dropping of the checkered flag.
Out front, the fight for the podium spots raged until the very end, with the top three being separated by just over half a second.
After controlling large portions of the race, pole-sitter Stoffel Vandoorne had to settle for sixth overall, and his teammate Jean-Eric Vergne capitalised on the chaos of the race to finish fifth.
McLaren also had a steady race, with Hughes and Rene Rast crossing the line in eighth and ninth.
All the Jaguar-powered cars scored points in the race, with Buemi coming home in tenth.
Formula E action continues next month with the double-header in Berlin for rounds seven and eight of the championship.
