Porsche Formula E Team takes the lead in India

First and second place went to Jean-Éric Vergne from team DS Penske and Nick Cassidy from Envision Racing. Originally, Sebastian Buemi had finished third. But due to a penalty post-race, he dropped to 15th place. An overpower infringement saw him demoted via a 17-second penalty, equivalent to a drive-through.

Following the fourth Formula E race in Hyderabad, the Tag Heuer Porsche Formula E team leads the season 9 ranking. This comes after its team members António Félix da Costa and Pascal Wehrlein took third and fourth palace in the race in southern India.

Wehrlein, who took the top step of the Formula E podium in both previous races at Diriyah in Saudi Arabia, holds on to the top spot in the drivers’ standing with 80 points after four of 16 races. “I started the race from the twelfth grid spot and earned points for fourth place – I’m very happy with that”, Wehrlein told reporters after the race.

At the season opener in Mexico and the double event in Saudi Arabia, a race car powered by Porsche won in each case. However, the India premiere of Formula E got off to the worst possible start for Porsche: Directly on his first fast lap, Wehrlein crashed in the fast turn 18 and reported a problem with the accelerator pedal as the cause via radio. For safety reasons, Porsche withdrew Felix Antonio da Costa’s second car and the two cars of customer team Andretti from the first practice session.

Although the engineers gave the all-clear before the second free practice, Porsche drivers could not quite make up for the shortened preparation on the completely new track – no Porsche-powered car made it to the knockout phase. The pole position was secured by Jaguar driver Mitch Evans ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne.

However, Evans could not convert his first grid position into a top result – and through no fault of his own. His teammate Sam Bird, of all people, misjudged a braking point and spun off Evans – a double retirement for Jaguar. This in turn benefited Vergne, who after a poor start to the season showed a clean race and finished ahead of the Envision Racing duo of Nick Cassidy and Sebastien Buemi at the Hyderabad E-Prix. Due to a penalty for Buemi after the end of the race, Porsche driver Antonio Felix da Costa ultimately finished third. As the field was quite close together due to a safety car phase shortly before the end, Buemi even dropped out of the points with the time penalty.

The ABB FIA Formula E World Championship now heads to Cape Town, South Africa. The fifth race of the season will take place there on 25 February.

porsche.com, fiaformulae.com, fiaformulae.com (team standings), fiaformulae.com (E-Prix results)