da Costa beats Gunther to Marrakesh FE win
Antonio Felix da Costa converted pole position into his first win of the 2019-2020 FIA Formula E season after beating Maximilian Gunther to victory in Marrakesh.
da Costa maintained first place with a great start and only briefly lost the lead when Gunther swept around the outside of Turn 1 on the 15th lap, before re-passing the BMW Andretti driver as the pair diced for the lead just as they did in Mexico.
Antonio Felix da Costa converted pole position into his first win of the 2019-2020 FIA Formula E season after beating Maximilian Gunther to victory in Marrakesh.
da Costa maintained first place with a great start and only briefly lost the lead when Gunther swept around the outside of Turn 1 on the 15th lap, before re-passing the BMW Andretti driver as the pair diced for the lead just as they did in Mexico.
On this occasion, it was da Costa who came out on top after tactically using Attack Mode to charge back past Gunther just four laps later to seal his and reigning champions Techeetah's first victory of the season with a comfortable 11-second margin.
The Portuguese racer, who scored his first FE victory since the 2018-2019 season-opener in Saudi Arabia, has now moved into the lead of the drivers’ championship. He is also the fifth different winner from the opening five rounds of the season.
Double FE champion Jean-Eric Vergne brilliantly scythed his way up through the order from 11th on the grid and looked set to claim second place after overtaking Gunther late on, only to dramatically lose the position again on the final lap.
Vergne aggressively defended from Gunther on multiple occasions but was unable to hold onto second, as the Mexico E-Prix winner snuck ahead to snatch second in the final few corners.
Vergne, who had battled illness throughout the weekend, just managed to hold off Nissan’s Sebastien Buemi to claim the final spot on the podium in third.
Edoardo Mortara took fourth for Venturi, while erstwhile points leader Mitch Evans bounced back from Jaguar’s qualifying nightmare in style to storm to sixth from the rear of the grid.
Audi’s Lucas di Grassi claimed seventh with a strong drive from 13th, ahead of Andre Lotterer who faded in the second half of the race for Porsche, and Oliver Rowland in the second Nissan.
Briton’s Sam Bird completed the points-scorers in 10th place for the Envision Virgin Racing squad.
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