FE | Mexico: Wehrlein dominates from pole and returns to victory

After the pole position achieved in the morning, Pascal Wehrlein repeated himself in the afternoon and achieved his first victory of the season, starting his Season 10 in the best possible way. The Porsche driver was the author of a race managed with great intelligence and in which he never fell beyond second place, always remaining in the top positions.

After an excellent sprint when the traffic lights went out which allowed him to maintain first place, Wehrlein immediately played on the attack, opting to activate both Attack Modes in the first 7 laps of the race. As was already seen in the last world championship, with this new generation of single-seaters the tendency is to exploit the Attack Modes as soon as possible, and then manage the energy in the rest of the race: an aspect that was also repeated in the first race of the Season 10 and taken to the extreme by the Porsche standard bearer.

Having activated the second Attack Mode quite early, Wehrlein ended up in second position behind Sebastien Buemi when the Safety Car came out during the eighth lap due to the accident involving Robin Frijns, who ended up on the wall after lost the car on the dirt leaving the stadium area. However, after the safety car returned to the pits, Buemi in turn also had to take advantage of his second Attack Mode, thus returning the lead of the race to the German manufacturer's driver.

From that moment on it was a solo effort for Wehrlein, who managed with great intelligence the phases in which to maintain a more careful pace to save energy and those in which to push, progressively widening the margin over the riders behind him, up to come to be able to count on an advantage of about two seconds. Although Buemi was able to close in on the final laps, halving the gap, the pace set by the German was still sufficient to cross the finish line ahead of everyone, thus collecting his fourth career victory, the second in Mexico City after that of 2022.

However, today's success still has a question mark: during the race, in fact, the stewards found a technical infringement which will be investigated after the race.

Behind the Wehrlein-Buemi duo, who turned the front row obtained in the morning into an excellent second place, there was also a podium for Nick Cassidy in his first weekend with the official Jaguar team. The New Zealand driver preceded Max Gunther, who with the Maserati started his world championship with a good fourth place: the German defended himself well by pulling ahead of the drivers behind him, so much so that he concluded with a lead of seven second on Mitch Evans, who was in clear difficulty in the final part of the race. For the trident brand, however, this is an excellent start, undoubtedly better than that seen last season: now the objective will be to continue building on this level to aim for the top.

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images

Maximilian Gunther, Maserati Racing, Maserati Tipo Folgore

Fifth place went to Evans, who in the second part of the race had to defend himself on several occasions from Jean-Eric Vergne, who was often threatening but who in the end was unable to find the right opening to attempt an attack and take the position away from the New Zealander. The Jaguar driver's difficulties at the end allowed the group to compact, so much so that eight drivers were behind him in less than three seconds. The first McLaren is that of Jake Hughes, in seventh position, who in turn preceded Stoffel Vandoorne and the comeback Andretti pair formed by Jake Dennis and Norman Nato.

For the American team and for the world champion it was not the start they had hoped for, above all due to a disappointing qualification which saw him eliminated already in the group stage: from fourteenth place the British recovered up to ninth position, bringing at least two useful points at home from a global perspective. It should be noted, however, that like Wehrlein, Dennis is also under investigation by the commissioners for a possible technical infringement.

Out of the points are the two Nissans of Oliver Rowland and Sacha Fenestraz, as well as the two Mahindras of Edoardo Mortara and Nyck de Vries, whose return to Formula E did not start in the best way, despite keeping in mind the limitations of the company's package Indiana. Equally disappointing was Sam Bird's first weekend in McLaren, only fourteenth after a qualifying that had already seen him excluded in the qualifying phase of group A.

Photo by: Andreas Beil

Jake Dennis, Andretti Autosport, Porsche 99X Electric Gen3

Jehan Daruvala was only sixteenth with the other Maserati, although it is important to mention that this is the Indian driver's absolute debut in the electric category, so there is an undoubted growth path that will continue in the rest of the championship.

Antonio Felix da Costa disappoints with the Porsche, forced to retire with the front suspension damaged after a contact with Nico Mueller of ABT in the early stages of the race. Lucas di Grassi also retired after being involved in an accident during the first lap, while Sergio Sette Camara with the ERT did not start due to a technical problem that did not even allow him to line up on the grid.