Mahindra driver Pascal Wehrlein reflected on a tough weekend at the Diriyah ePrix after he failed to score points in either race.
The German driver impressed during his debut season in Formula E last year but finished 11th and 15th on the opening weekend of the 2019-20 season.
Wehrlein suffered damage during race two following an incident with Envision Virgin Racing driver Sam Bird and he felt this cost him a shot at his first points of the season.
“It’s been a challenging start to the season,” he said.
“I didn’t have the qualifying I had hoped for but we were looking good for a strong points finish on Saturday until I sustained damage in a racing incident and was forced to pit for a new front wing. We will now regroup as a team and look forward to a stronger weekend in Santiago.”
Wehrlein’s teammate Jerome D’Ambrosio did fare slightly better, reaching super pole on Friday and finishing ninth in race one.
However, the Belgian was unable to start race two, despite sitting fourth on the grid, when his car refused to start.
While D’Ambrosio was clearly disappointed with the result, he was still able to reflect on his positive performances in qualifying.
“This weekend has been my best qualifying result with Mahindra Racing – two Super Poles are a fantastic result and these are the positives I will be taking away with me from the weekend,” he said.
“We clearly still have some work to do when it comes to race pace, and not being able to start today was a huge disappointment, but we now focus on Santiago.”
Mahindra sits tenth in the championship after the first weekend with just two points and CEO Dilbagh Gill clearly felt the team had been unlucky.
He said: “This was certainly not the start to the season that we had hoped for, or deserved, and we are disappointed not to have continued our run of podium finishes at the opening races.
“However, we can take some positives; with a strong performance in qualifying securing two Super Poles.
“We have a two-month gap until the next race so we will be working hard to improve our overall package and hope to see our qualifying pace translate into a strong race pace in Santiago.”