Oliver Rowland wins for the first time in Mexico City! Official F1 Journal Mexico City E-Prix report

Credit: Simon Galloway

Great Britain and Nissan's Oliver Rowland took victory in Mexico City for the first time in his Formula E career, on Saturday afternoon in the Mexican capital.

The Nissan driver maximised fortune with the second attack mode and took the lead in between two short safety car periods, which were for David Beckmann and Mitch Evans respectively. Due to his DNF, Evans has lost the championship lead tat he came into the round with after winning in Sao Paulo.

Rowland took the victory ahead of the two Porsche drivers, who secured Porsche's first double podium in the Gen3 Formula E era. It would be Antonio Felix Da Costa who took second ahead of pole sitter Pascal Wehrlein, who had to settle for third. 

Da Costa now takes the championship lead into round three and four next time out in Jeddah and the Portuguese driver has taken two second place finishes in 2024/25.

How the 2024/25 Mexico City E-Prix unfolded

Formula E had descended on Mexico City this weekend, more specifically the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, for round two of the 2024/25 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.

It had been a busy day previously with the second free practice session and qualifying session taking place in the morning of Saturday in Mexico City. The qualifying had been the most recent session ahead of the E-Prix and set the grid for the race start.

It would be Pascal Wehrlein who would take pole position for the second successive time in Mexico City and in doing so would make it back to back pole positions. This would follow on from him taking pole back in the opening round in Sao Paulo - in December.

Wehrlein would beat his Porsche teammate Antonio Felix Da Costa in the duels final to claim the position of starting the race from the front of the field. Wehrlein would be looking to convert pole into victory, which had not happened at all in Formula E since Wehrlein did it in Mexico in the 2023/24 season.

It would be a Porsche front lock out in Mexico, with Jean-Eric Vergne starting third with Oliver Rowland in fourth. Both drivers made it to the semi finals of the duels but would make it no further and would have to settle for a second row start.

Championship leader Mitch Evans would start from fifth, whereas an exclusion from Group B in qualifying saw his Jaguar teammate Nick Cassidy set to start 22nd. Sebastian Buemi would also be excluded from qualifying in group A and would start 21st.

Jake Hughes of Maserati would take a grid penalty for impeding Robin Frijns of three places and that would increase the difficulty of his task on the grid.

It would be the time for the start of the race as the starting formalities had been completed for 36 laps of racing. 

The lights would go out and a good start for both Porsche cars saw them maintain first and second with Wehrlein leading from Da Costa. The top four would complete the opening lap in the same order they started before Rowland moved up into third at the very start of lap 2.

Jake Dennis would move up to fifth on the opening lap, which would have been a great start for him with championship leader Mitch Evans dropping down to seventh. 

The two Porsche drivers would be maintaining the top two spots early on but Rowland would be piling the pressure on Da Costa. 

Contact on the opening lap would see Dan Ticktum go into a spin in the stadium section. Ticktum would be tagged round in the stadium section by the Maserati of Jake Hughes and this would relegate Ticktum to the back of the field. Ticktum would pit and rejoin the race but would be a distance behind the rest of the field.

Lap three would see the first attack mode usage and it would be Taylor Barnard in 15th who would bolt first and he would be hoping to make progress after a difficult qualifying earlier on in the day.

It would be lap five before any other drivers made the move for attack mode as Sam Bird and David Beckmann were the drivers to take to the attack mode. 

Bird would be in the action as he was involved in a tight fight with the two Mahindra drivers with contact between he and Nyck De Vries, as the Dutchman made his way through ahead of the McLaren.

Bird also made contact with the other Mahindra of Edoardo Mortara and that incident would be put under investigation by the stewards

Barnard, who passed Bird, let his teammate back through easily after overtaking, due to Bird's mass amount of overtake and the young driver not wanting to hold his more experienced teammate up.

After doing this, Barnard would be passed by Beckmann and this would eave Barnard offset to the Maserati of Stoffel Vandoorne, who also found his way past.

De Vries and Andretti's Nico Mueller would also go for the attack mode and on lap 11 the two drivers would find their way ahead of Bird, after Bird was offset by De Vries' move. Muller however was showing great pace and was making use of the advantage.

By the end of lap 12, Mueller would make his way up to sixth to maximise the attack mode, to elevate himself up a position. He caught up to Jake Dennis and allowed his Andretti teammate to take his attack mode.

Soon enough on lap 14, Wehrlein would take the opportunity to get attack mode as would Vergne. Wehrlein would be assisted by his Porsche teammate Da Costa in to keep track position. However, Da Costa had offset himself and was swamped by Dennis, Vergne and Rowland and would be down to fifth.

Dennis was making use of his first attack mode brilliantly and he had caught up to Wehrlein after passing Vergne and Rowland to make his way up into second. Into the stadium section and it was sublime from Dennis as he made his way through to take the lead from seventh on the grid.

Da Costa would then take the attack mode as would Gunther but it would be Da Costa who would make the most of it as he would fire himself through to take the lead with a stunning pass to overtake the Andretti of Dennis.

At the other end of th Andretti garage, Mueller would take his second attack mode early on would be pursuing the front runners to try and support his teammate Dennis up front to help Andretti and play the team game. Mueller would take third from Wehrlein who would take to attack mode for the second time.

Wehrlein would pick up his second attack mode and he would sit in fourth ahead of Jaguar's Mitch Evans who would elevate himself back into the top five following his first attack mode of the race.

Lap 22 and Dennis would regain the lead as he also on his second attack mode would take the lead from Da Costa with all the top three on attack mode this would be about to get really tense.

Da Costa would find his way by with a superior amount of attack mode in comparison to Dennis and soon enough another lap later and it would be a Porsche 1-2 with Wehrlein in second place and Da Costa in the lead.

Bird's incident with Mortara had not gone well with the stewards and he would receive a five-second time penalty for his troubles. On lap 26, he would have his second attack mode and in the middle of train headed by Stoffel Vandoorne in ninth.

Drama on lap 28 as David Beckmann made contact with Lucas Di Grassi and it would be the end of the race and the safety car would be deployed which would have re-grouped the back together again. 

A couple of laps would go by and the safety car would be in at the end of the lap. Rowland with attack mode left from his intake of attack mode before the safety car had 90 seconds remaining. 

The green flag would be flying and immediately Rowland was on the move and would get by Dennis into the first corner. Soon enough it would be the turn of Wehrlein to eb overtaken and then brilliantly it would be Da Costa.

Just as Rowland had taken the race lead from Da Costa, the safety car would be brought back out again for this time championship leader Mitch Evans who collided with Nico Mueller on the restart and he would be out of the race.

A short stoppage under the safety car and all of a sudden, the race would be back underway with Rowland in the lead and there would be no added laps at the end of the race in what was set to be a dramatic sprint to the finish.

Rowland would have limited energy but would make it work and would hold off the two Porsche drivers to take his first ever win in Mexico City as he won the 2024/25 Mexioc City E-Prix from fourth on the grid.

To conclude a fantastic race Rowland would take the win ahead of Da Costa and Wehrlein who would complete the podium finishers. With that second place finish, Da Costa now takes over the lead of the drivers championship. 

Jake Dennis who led the race at moments had to settle for fourth while Jean-Eric Vergne completed the top five. Maximilian Gunther finished sixth just behind his DS Penske teammate ahead of Maserati's Stoffel Vandoorne in seventh.

Nyck De Vries of Mahindra finished eighth ahead of Andretti's Nico Mueller with Taylor Barnard completing the top 10 for NEOM McLaren and taking the fastest lap of the race late on.

2024/25 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship: Round 2 - Mexico City E-Prix provisional classification

1. Oliver Rowland (Great Britain, Nissan)
2. Antonio Felix Da Costa (Portugal, Porsche)
3. Pascal Wehrlein (Germany, Porsche)
4. Jake Dennis (Great Britain, Andretti)
5. Jean-Eric Vergne (France, DS Penske)
6. Maximilian Gunther (Germany, DS Penske)
7. Stoffel Vandoorne (Belgium, Maserati)
8. Nyck De Vries (Netherlands, Mahindra Racing)
9. Nico Mueller (Switzerland, Andretti)
10. Taylor Barnard (Great Britain, NEOM McLaren)
11. Jake Hughes (Great Britain, Maserati)
12. Robin Frijns (Netherlands, Envision Racing)
13. Sebastian Buemi (Switzerland, Envision Racing)
14. Nick Cassidy (New Zealand, Jaguar)
15. Norman Nato (France, Nissan)
16. Lucas Di Grassi (Brazil, ABT Lola Cars)
17. Edoardo Mortara (Switzerland, Mahindra Racing)
18. Zane Maloney (Barbados, ABT Lola Cars)
19. Dan Ticktum (Great Britain, Cupra Kiro)
20. Sam Bird (Great Britain, NEOM McLaren)

DNF. Mitch Evans (New Zealand, Jaguar)
DNF. David Beckmann (Germany, Cupra Kiro) 

Brandon Whiteside
​Writer & X Contributor - F1 Journal