Rowland snatches victory from Porsche after late safety car

Oliver Rowland claimed victory in the Mexico City E-Prix, beating Porsche’s Pascal Wehrlein and Antonio Felix da Costa after capitalising on a late safety car restart to snatch the win.

The Nissan driver was running only fourth on lap 28 of the scheduled 36 and several seconds behind race leader da Costa and Wehrlein, both of whom had been the pacesetters throughout having locked out the front row.

While the two Porsches and third-place Jake Dennis had taken both Attack Modes, offering 350kW and all-wheel-drive this season, Rowland activated his final six minutes just moments before the first of two late safety cars were deployed.

With just over a minute of extra power remaining at the restart on lap 31, Rowland immediately demoted Dennis for third coming out of the final corner before lunging up the inside of Wehrlein into Turn 5.

Having looked to the outside of da Costa into T9 before backing out, Rowland got the run out of the corner and dived to the inside into Turn 12 to take the lead just seconds before his extra power ran dry and another safety car was called into action for an incident behind.

With four laps remaining Rowland caught the chasing pack napping with a quick restart and despite having slightly less energy than da Costa behind, was able to hold on for his first win of the season.

Rowland had started fourth but soon moved up to third at the expense of Jean-Eric Vergne into Turn 1 on the second lap, as Wehrlein headed da Costa at the front.

But thereafter the opening half of the race was a processional affair as overtaking proved difficult without the extra power afforded by Attack Mode, as drivers held on to the two activations until later.

It took until lap 14 for the leading runners to move off-line in the stadium section for Attack Mode, with Wehrlein the first to blink, rejoining alongside da Costa.

As Wehrlein maintained the lead, da Costa was shuffled back behind Rowland through the final turn and then fell behind Vergne and Dennis after running slightly wide at Turn 1.

Dennis soon moved up to second with his extra power and demoted Wehrlein for the lead having pulled off a switchback in the stadium section on lap 16.

But as the Briton’s energy ran out he became a sitting duck to those behind him now armed with more power, notably da Costa who moved into the lead on lap 19.

Wehrlein took his second Attack Mode on lap 20 from third but despite the extra performance he was unable to usurp Dennis, who took his second Attack Mode a lap later.

Dennis found himself back in the lead on lap 22 as da Costa took his final Attack Mode, rejoining just in front of Wehrlein, but as earlier in the race Dennis slipped back when his extra performance ended.

Antonio Felix da Costa TAG Heuer Porsche Formula E Team Porsche 99X Electric Gen3

Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images

Da Costa moved back into the lead on lap 23 into Turn 12 before Wehrlein made it a Porsche 1-2 a lap later into Turn 9 and seemingly with the race in hand.

But the complexion of the race changed several laps later when broken suspension for David Beckmann’s Cupra Kiro after contact with Zan Maloney’s Lola-Yamaha Abt left the German stranded at Turn 12.

The following safety car ultimately allowed Rowland, who had been more than 2s behind Dennis at that stage of the race, to capitalise and claim an unlikely win.

Despite a second safety car on lap 31 after Sao Paulo winner Mitch Evans broke his suspension on the rear of Nico Muller’s Andretti which left him stuck on track, Rowland headed da Costa and Wehrlein at the chequered flag.

Dennis just missed out on the podium in fourth, ahead of the DS Penske drivers of Vergne and Maximilian Guenther.

Maserati MSG’s Stoffel Vandoorne and Mahindra’s Nyck de Vries took seventh and eighth, with Muller finishing ninth having helped Dennis maintain track position through the Attack Mode phase.

Taylor Barnard completed the top 10, the McLaren driver having been the first to take an Attack Mode but retaining the second for later in proceedings which he used to good effect having started 19th.

Mexico City E-Prix result