Rome E-Prix 1 – Mitch Evans got finally got Jaguar’s season started right with victory ahead of Envision and Mercedes .
Post-qualifying, Dragon/Penske racer Sergio Sette Camara was given a three place grid drop for driving too fast after the red flags were shown in FP2, he had qualified P20 but will now start behind his teammate Antonio Giovinazzi on the last row.
Stoffel Vandoorne was on pole for the second time this season and the Mercedes was joined on the front row by the bright green of Robin Frijns’ Envision Racing car. The Dutchman had a look but there was no space for him to try to make a move for the lead before they reached the first corner.
Race Results – 2022 Rome E-Prix 1
There was a first lap incident which saw Oliver Rowland being hit from behind by the championship leader, Edoardo Mortara, knocking him nose-first into the wall, and blocking the track which caused a back up of traffic. The Venturi driver was given a 5 second time penalty for causing the collision.
The Mahindra made it back to the pits but for a nose change, but Nissan e.dams racer Maximilian Guenther had taken damage at the incident, and ended his race in the wall a few corners later. That initially brought out yellow but was soon upped to a five minute Safety Car to clear the German’s car.
It was an untroubled restart for Vandoorne, but the Mercedes wasn’t able to pull more than half a second ahead of Frijns in the following few laps.
With 29 minutes on the clock Antonio Felix da Costa was the first of the top runners to take Attack Mode, he fell behind his teammate in P5 but was soon let back through. Just after that, there was a change at the front as Frijns made his move and made it work. THe two Mercedes and Vergne took their first Attack Modes then allowing da Costa to slip through to P2, and Frjins was able to pull a good enough gap that when he went off-line to the activation zone a lap later, he was able to hold the lead.
Da Costa was unable to hold onto the places he’d made up and fell back to P5 as the cars still in the higher power mode regained their spots, and it got even worse for the Portuguese a few minutes later as a tap from Jake Dennis saw him out of shape which saw the Andretti and Mitch Evans get past him. Dennis was later handed a 5 second time penalty.
At the front, Frijns was the first to take his second Attack Mode, the Envision rejoining just behind Vandoorne but put the added power to good use and retook the position a few corners later. Behind them Vergne also went for Attack Mode at the same time but had to deal with Evans as he rejoined the racing line. Despite the Techeetah being in Attack Mode, it was the Jaguar who was making the moves, the Kiwi staying ahead of Vergne and then sending it down the inside of de Vries for P3.
As Frijns’ Attack Mode ended, Vandoorne behind him still had 100 seconds to play with but didn’t even need twenty of those to take back his place at the front of the field. With the top two both finished with the power boosts, there was still only less than a second separating them, but third placed Evans had only just activated his final four minutes of added power.
At the front, for the third time at the same corner, Frijns had managed to get back into P1 and Evans had made it into P2 and was nose to tail with the Envision. With over a minute of Attack Mode left, the Jaguar, who had started P9, was into the lead and over the next few laps, pulled out over two seconds of a gap to Frijns.
Dennis, with five seconds to add to his race time, used up a few percent more energy than the cars around him to make it to P2 but it didn’t last with first Vandoorne using his FanBoost to get past and then Frijns, Vergne and Mortara got though while the Andretti driver had to reassess his energy strategy. The Andretti driver falling completely out of the points by the end of the race.
After the Safety Car period at the start of the E-Prix, there were 5 minutes and 15 seconds added to the race time one the clock had ticked down to four minutes on the original time. While Evans had pulled more than seven seconds ahead, it was all to play for behind as P2-P6 were all line astern and trying to make a move on the driver in front can give an opportunity to strike to the driver behind. That scenario played out for Frijns as the Dutch driver was having a look at Vandoorne, Vergne took advantage and took P3.
It was all change in the final few minutes, Frijns slipping past Vergne around turn 15 and then takes P2 from Vandoorne, and pulling ahead of the fight for P3. Bird had made it through to P5 and both he and Vergne were right behind Vandoorne looking for any opportunity to take the final podium position.
The Mercedes driver managed to hold his challengers off, to take the final step on the rostrum, Vergne ended P4 while Bird was P5. A relief for Jaguar whose only points of the year had been a P4 and P10 in the opening round of the year.
Da Costa was P6 in the second Techeetah, with Mortara, P7, as the only Venturi to take points. Pascal Wehrlein and Andre Lotterer were P8 and P10, split by the Envison of Nick Cassidy.
There were three non-finishers, Guenther after his incident on lap one, Rowland who retired to the pits halfway though, and de Vries who had been out of the points and retired a couple of laps before the end.
