Stoffel Vandoorne classified fourth after crashing out in chaotic rain-hit race on the streets of New York City

The New York City E-Prix was red-flagged after rain began to fall, causing several accidents that also involved Stoffel Vandoorne. The two Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team drivers ultimately finished fourth and eighth in round eleven of the 2021/22 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.

• Stoffel qualified third in his group for the knock-out stages of qualifying and moved through to the final where he missed Pole Position by the narrow margin of just eight thousandths of a second. He subsequently started the race from P2.
• Nyck was sixth-fastest in Group A, qualifying eleventh on the grid.
• Stoffel started from the front row of the grid for the tenth time in his Formula E career. On his side of the grid, however, grip conditions were worse, so he lost two positions at the start.
• Stoffel fought his way back up into P2 during the course of the 29 laps of the race that were actually run. The rain started to get progressively heavier around ten minutes before the end, making the track increasingly slippery and triggering a full course yellow period shortly afterwards.
• Several drivers, including race leader Nick Cassidy, Lucas di Grassi and Stoffel suddenly lost control of their cars on the rain-soaked track and slid straight on and into the barriers.
• The E-Prix was then red flagged and not restarted. In accordance with the regulations, the race was classified according to the penultimate lap before the red flag. As a result, Stoffel was classified fourth despite his accident.
• Nyck moved up several positions early on and was soon well within the top ten but dropped down the field a little to finish tenth – two time penalties rewarded after the race to other drivers saw him classify P8 in the end.
• Edoardo Mortara (142 points) leads the Drivers’ Championship by 5 points from Stoffel (137 points) in second place. Nyck (77 points) is in seventh place.
• Venturi Racing (226 points) leads the Team Championship after the eleventh round of the season ahead of the Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team (214 points).
• The next race of the 2021/22 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship will take place tomorrow, Sunday, July 17 2022, at the same venue in New York City.

Stoffel Vandoorne:

“Unfortunately, the race ended badly with a big crash. I aquaplaned and just lost control. I think the top three all spun off when the rain began to fall. A pretty dramatic end to the race, quite frankly. It’s not how I wanted it to finish, but that’s the way it is. I think this E-Prix was an intense affair right from the start and probably not one of our best races, if I might say so. We were a bit lacking in pace but were still up there with the front-runners. Once it was dry, it felt like things were on the up and I thought the race was going my way. I gradually moved up into P2 but then it started to rain and things got a bit tougher. Let’s wait and see what tomorrow brings.”

Nyck de Vries:

“That was a very eventful race which ended abruptly and in an extremely aggressive manner because of the rain. Our race went fairly well. I felt I was quite competitive and fast at the start of the E-Prix but lost some of the edge to my competitiveness towards the end. I was probably a little too conservative once the rain began to fall. At least we got some points out of this race. We might have stayed up front had we been slightly better placed in qualifying. Still, we’ll get another chance tomorrow.”

Ian James, Team Principal:

“It’s been a day where, overall, we can be pleased with our performance. In qualifying Stoffel optimised the circumstances and made it into the Final round of the session, ultimately missing out on pole position by only 0.008 sec. A solid result, even though we were obviously disappointed not to have achieved Pole.

From there we felt we were able to put ourselves in a position to capitalise on the performance and hope to score some decent points. Unfortunately, the rain that came down about two thirds into the race, was pretty heavy, and that meant that standing water quickly developed along the track. At that point, the tyres have worn significantly and it was almost inevitable that at some stage something would happen – and it did. Unfortunately, Stoffel was in a position that caught him out, as one of the leading cars, and was unable to avoid the standing water.

Above all, I’m extremely happy all drivers involved are OK. Despite that there is some significant damage to the cars. In the end, I think the FIA took the right decision to, firstly, red flag the race and secondly, not restart after; all decisions were taken with the safety of the drivers in mind. Then, as per procedure, the running order of the penultimate lap before the red flag was taken as the final race result, meaning P4 (Stoffel) and P10 (Nyck) for us. Some penalties across the grid saw Nyck move up to P8 in the final classification – securing some important points for both drivers and the team.

There is a lot of work ahead tonight for the team. On top of all the normal race preparation for tomorrow and debriefs of today’s race, we have a car that is severely damaged. Stoffel’s car returned to our garage in a bad state. It will be a tough challenge for the mechanics, into the late hours. I’m extremely grateful for the effort they have already put in – and it will be impressive to see how they will turn around the work before tomorrow’s early practice session. Then, tomorrow, we will give it our all again.”