de Vries Wins Extraordinary First Valencia E-Prix

Calum Gill 16:24 24/04/2021

Nyck de Vries took his second win of the 2020-21 Formula E season after an extraordinary ending to the inaugural Valencia E-Prix, where half of the field ran out of energy.

Pole sitter António Félix da Costa had led the race until the final lap when he slowed due to having a lack of energy, allowing de Vries to sail past into turn 1. Multiple drivers were disqualified as a result of running out of energy.

A large factor in this farcical end to the E-Prix was that as the safety car was deployed five times, the energy offset was therefore deployed 5 times. This led to the offset being 19 Kw, meaning multiple drivers had not done the conservation required to finish the race.

Da Costa had stretched out a 1.7 second lead when the safety car came in at the end of lap 1, but that was curtailed when the safety car was again deployed. This was for Sébastian Buemi's beached Nissan after the season 2 champion was turned around at turn 9 by Porsche's André Lotterer.

Reigning champion da Costa made a good restart but that was halted when the safety car made its third appearance of the afternoon, this time for the crashed BMW of Max Guenther at turn 2. The German lost the rear on entry and slid across the gravel trap.

The restart was clean but it was not long before another safety car period. This time for the beached Dragon of Sérgio Sette Camara after contact with Mitch Evans at turn 9. This came about as a result of Evans re-joining the racing line after activating his attack mode. The New Zealander retired to the pits at then end of the lap.

Da Costa had been in control of proceedings, leading by up to four seconds, as de Vries recovered on merit to second from a five-place grid penalty served for a crash in the previous Rome race. But a late safety car - called for Lotterer taking out Edoardo Mortara at Turn 1 - turned the race on its head.

The field crossed the line with a two-lap sprint to the finish. Starting the last lap, Da Costa hit energy limits and slowed immediately on the run to Turn 1 to give long-time pursuer de Vries the lead. As many drivers slowed on the track, it allowed 22nd-starting Nico Muller to finish a most unlikely runner-up as Vandoorne capitalised for the final step on the podium after starting at the back following a tyre infraction in qualifying. The Belgian had initially put it on pole.

Behind the double podium for Mercedes at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo, Envision Virgin Racing driver Nick Cassidy ran to fourth ahead of Audi charge René Rast. Robin Frijns bagged sixth as da Costa fell down to seventh ahead of second-starting Alex Lynn and Sam Bird. Lucas di Grassi, Jake Dennis and the Jean-Éric Vergne were the only other drivers to be classified and avoid disqualification.