Diriyah E-Prix: Cassidy scores first win for Jaguar, moves into points lead

The Jaguar driver, who had finished third in the opening race in Saudi Arabia, took the lead as early as lap five having started third on the grid.

He retained his position at the head of the field even when taking both his Attack Mode activations before managing the remainder of the 36-lap to head home Envision’s Frijns and Nissan’s Oliver Rowland.

Polesitter Rowland initially launched well of the line at the start but bogging down in the second phase of acceleration allowed fellow front row stater Frijns to pull alongside and take the lead into the opening turn.

The Nissan driver lost a further position to Cassidy on lap four as he took the first of his Attack Mode activations and began to gradually drop away from the leading pair.

This allowed Frijns to relinquish the lead to Cassidy a lap later after taking Attack Mode but only drop to second, as Cassidy began to increase the pace at the head of the field in order to build a gap to the Dutchman behind.

Cassidy had built up a 1.6s advantage to Frijns which would likely have been enough to retain the lead when taking his first Attack Mode, but he maintained the same gap as Frijns took his second activation at the same time on lap seven.

When Cassidy took his final Attack Mode on lap 13, he comfortably retained the lead having built a gap of almost 2s before he began to slow his pace and back Frijns into the chasing pack.

This was headed by Rowland, McLaren’s Jake Hughes, DS Penske’s Stoffel Vandoorne and the second Nissan of Sacha Fenestraz, with the top six having taken both Attack Mode activations by half distance.

Behind, Mexico City E-Prix winner Pascal Wehrlein was making good progress after starting 10th, overtaking Sam Bird on the exit of Turn 19 after the McLaren driver had tried to make a move on Jean-Eric Vergne ahead.

Bird would pull into the pits the next time round after hitting the wall and damaging his suspension, while Wehrlein made short work of Vergne, passing the DS Penske driver into Turn 1 to move into seventh.

Further back, race one winner in Diriyah and reigning champion Jake Dennis struggled to make progress from his starting position of 14th.

Shadowing Mitch Evans, the Jaguar driver having started one spot ahead on the grid, the Andretti driver moved ahead as the Kiwi took his second Attack Mode.

Back at the front, Cassidy managed his pace over the second half of the race, his lead never more than a few tenths of a second yet he never faced a serious test from Frijns or Rowland behind.

Behind the podium finishers the order remained unchanged in a race which settled down as Hughes headed Vandoorne, Fenestraz, Wehrlein, Vergne and Maserati MSG’s Maximilian Guenther.

Dennis finished 10th on-the-road as well as claiming the fastest lap, but he was handed a five-second penalty for passing Evans under yellow flags.

This was after Evans had gone to take his Attack Mode, the caution flags out after Maserati MSG’s Jehan Daruvala had pulled off the track due to a brake failure.

The decision dropped Dennis to 12th, while his team-mate Norman Nato and ERT’s Sergio Sette Camara were also handed 5s penalties for the same offense.

Diriyah E-Prix - Race results:

Main Information Additional Data Additional Data Driver Info

       

Driver Info			Main Information Additional Data
Cla	Driver	#		Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Points	Retirement
1	N. Cassidy Jaguar Racing	37		36	43'51.868			25
2	R. Frijns Envision Racing	4		36	+1.192 43'53.060	1.192		18
3	O. Rowland Nissan e.dams	22		36	+1.875 43'53.743	0.683		18
4	J. Hughes McLaren	5		36	+2.931 43'54.799	1.056		12
5	S. Vandoorne DS Penske	2		36	+3.397 43'55.265	0.466		10
6	S. Fenestraz Nissan e.dams	23		36	+4.598 43'56.466	1.201		8
7	P. Wehrlein Porsche Team	94		36	+4.816 43'56.684	0.218		6
8	J. Vergne DS Penske	25		36	+5.195 43'57.063	0.379		4
9	M. Gunther Maserati Racing	7		36	+5.709 43'57.577	0.514		2
10	J. Dennis Andretti Formula E	1		36	+6.240 43'58.108	0.531		2
11	M. Evans Jaguar Racing	9		36	+6.866 43'58.734	0.626
12	E. Mortara Mahindra Racing	48		36	+10.116 44'01.984	3.250
13	N. Müller Team Abt	51		36	+14.462 44'06.330	4.346
14	A. Felix da Costa Porsche Team	13		36	+17.960 44'09.828	3.498
15	N. de Vries Mahindra Racing	21		36	+19.295 44'11.163	1.335
16	N. Nato Andretti Formula E	17		36	+20.235 44'12.103	0.940
17	S. Sette Camara ERT Formula E Team	3		36	+21.564 44'13.432	1.329
18	L. di Grassi Team Abt	11		36	+25.639 44'17.507	4.075
dnf	D. Ticktum ERT Formula E Team	33		32	+4 Laps 41'33.940	4 Laps			Retirement
dnf	J. Daruvala Maserati Racing	18		25	+11 Laps 30'55.484	7 Laps			Retirement
dnf	S. Bird McLaren	8		22	+14 Laps 27'34.329	3 Laps			Retirement
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