Envision Racing brought home points in Sao Paulo on Saturday, in what was an incredibly dramatic opening race of Season 11 of the ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.
Sebastien Buemi started the race in P12 and battled throughout the various safety car and red flag periods to ultimately finish P8 on the track – and P7 after a post-race penalty was applied.
Teammate Robin Frijns unfortunately suffered a brake system alert issue and did not start the E-Prix in Brazil.
A lot to debrief after a dramatic race! 😮💨 pic.twitter.com/F9vCMvAKFQ
— Envision Racing (@Envision_Racing) December 7, 2024
The debut race of the GEN3 Evo era brought plenty of action – with the first all-wheel drive launch start providing a blistering race to the first corner, Attack Mode enabling drivers to make more significant progress through the field than ever before, and new tyres adding more grip and speed .
While it was a disappointment for the team to miss out on a potential double points finish, the weekend nonetheless gave the team a huge amount of data and learnings to take forward into the New Year for Round 2 in Mexico City.
QUALIFYING
The first qualifying session of Season 11 saw the Envision Racing drivers of Buemi and Frijns in opposite groups to tackle the Gen3 Evo for the first time in a competitive timed session.
Buemi was first of the duo to hit the track, in Group A. The 12-minute session allowed for three push 300kW laps around the Sambadrome. As expected, the 11 cars were narrowly separated, and drivers diced for a position in the top four.
After a strong first and second sector, Buemi struggled with the handling of the rear tyres in the final sector and ultimately finished the session in sixth, narrowly missing out by one tenth of a second to fourth and three tenths off eventual group winner, Jake Dennis.
Frijns’ session, meanwhile, was disrupted by an early red flag – one caused by the Jaguar driver of Mitch Evans stopping on the circuit. This left the remaining ten cars to fight it out for a place in the duels.
After a strong first run for the Dutchman, he failed to translate the promising pace to a spot in the top four. Seventh was the final result in the incredibly close pack, with Robin just two tenths of a second away from proceeding to the duels.
With Pascal Wehrlein emerging from Group B to take pole, that put Buemi P12 on the grid, with teammate Frijns behind in P13.
THE RACE
The initial start was aborted due to Envision Racing driver Frijns receiving a brake system alert, leading to the Green Machine being pushed off the grid for safety reasons. Despite the teams’ best efforts to resolve the issue, the car was retired.
The race got going smoothly at the second time of asking – at least until Lap 3, when the first safety car was deployed due to an incident between Muller and Hughes.
Shortly after the restart, on Lap 9, Buemi took six out of the allocated eight minutes of Attack Mode and rapidly made his way through the pack. The all-wheel drive mode allowed the Swiss to charge through from P16 to P5.
As others took Attack Mode, the order reshuffled which dropped Buemi back down the order, before the red flag was brought out, due to Dennis stopping on track on Lap 22.
After replacing the damaged front wing on the #16 car during the stoppage, Buemi had to restart down in P17. However, the action was brought to an abrupt halt once again on Lap 30 – a huge accident involving Wehrlein causing another red flag.
With four laps remaining and two minutes of Attack Mode left, Buemi used the extra power to good use, climbing up the field to eventually cross the line in P8, bringing home four points to kick start the championship campaign.
With Nissan driver Norman Nato handed a post-race five-second penalty, Buemi was ultimately promoted to P7.
DRIVER REACTION
Sebastien Buemi said: “A very eventful day and an eventful race – one of the most eventful I’ve been involved in. We finished P7 in the end.
“I am a bit disappointed still as I think we made a few silly mistakes. We could have got a bit more out of it but in the end I am still happy to score points. We move on to Mexico but there are things we need to work on and optimise. But, at the end of the day, we got some points in the bag.”
STANDINGS
Driver Standings (after Rd1)
1. Mitch Evans, 25pts
2. Antonio Felix Da Costa, 18pts
3. Taylor Barnard, 15pts
4. Sam Bird, 12pts
5. Edoardo Mortara, 10pts
——–
7. Sebastien Buemi, 6 pts
——–
17. Robin Frijns, 0pts
Team Standings (after Rd1)
1.NEOM McLaren Formula E Team, 27pts
2. Jaguar TCS Racing, 25pts
3. TAG Heuer Porsche Formula E Team, 21pts
4. Mahindra Racing, 16pts
5. Envision Racing, 6pts
