Alexander Sims secured his first win in Formula E after dominating the second AD Diriyah E-Prix of the weekend. But as always it was another frantic Formula E race.
Sims looked like he had learnt from the failures of yesterdays race when he fell to eighth after qualifying on pole. The Brit sprinted away at the start, so he could use Attack Mode and not lose the lead of the race to Sebastien Buemi.
There were several safety car periods during the race, but Sims was able to restart the race perfectly, and when his teammate Max Gunther was behind him the win never looked in doubt.
BMW claimed a one-two as Max Gunther managed to overtake Lucas Di Grassi and Stoffel Vandoorne as they went into Attack Mode. There were some questions if Gunther was allowed to keep that position as it looked like he overtook under safety car conditions. Still, the German driver was never specifically under investigation for the passes, but the safety care period is under investigation
But as the race concluded, Andre Lotterer was given a drive-through penalty for overtaking under the safety car period, but there was no sign that Gunther was going to receive a penalty. Lotterer dropped from sixth to 16th due to the penalty
Lucas Di Grassi was unable to get passed the Gunther in the closing stages and had to settle for third place.
Stoffel Vandoorne secured a fourth-place finish for Mercedes and capped off a great opening race weekend from the German team. Edoardo Mortara finished the race in fifth place for Venturi confirming that the Mercedes power-unit is maybe very competitive in season six.
Oliver Rowland fought his way through the field from 14th to finish the race in sixth place. Nyck De Vries came from the back row of the grid in 23rd to finish the race in seventh and take home more points for Mercedes.
Oliver Turvey secured points for the NIO 333 team by coming home in eighth place, Daniel Abt cam home in ninth and James Calado also secured a point on his Formula E debut weekend.
It was a horrible day for Envision Virgin Racing, both cars retired from the race as Sam Bird, and Mitch Evans came together at Turn 3. Bird fell four positions but was slow at Turn 4 and was hit by Pascal Wehrelin which sent The Brit into the wall. Evans was given a drive-through penalty for the incident.
Robin Frijns lost the car by himself and hit the wall causing his retirement and produced the second safety car of the race.
Antonio Felix Da Costa and Sebastien Buemi had a coming together at Turn 18 which saw Buemi spin. Both drivers were given separate penalties which destroyed their points-scoring opportunities. Da costa got a drive-through for causing the crash, but Buemi got a penalty for an unsafe reentry onto the track.
Jean-Eric Vergne only recovered to 15th after starting from last and receiving a ten-second stop-go penalty for his battery change.
Jerome D’Ambrosio had a technical issue at the start of the race and was unable to get off the line.