The Formula E double-header in Saudi Arabia proved to be a challenging weekend for the Jaguar TDS Racing team, with both Mitch Evans and Nick Cassidy facing significant setbacks through the weekend.
The opening qualifying session offered a promising start for the pair; Evans secured P5 and a place in the Duels, though ultimately losing to McLaren’s Taylor Barnard in the Quarter-Finals by a mere 0.014 seconds. Cassidy, finished ninth in Qualifying, just missing out on the Duels by a tenth of a second.
Race 1 began with an action-packed first lap that unfortunately saw Evans make contact with Pascal Wehrlein’s Porsche and Nyck de Vries’s Mahindra, resulting in front-wing damage.
After trying to continue, the Jaguar TCS Racing #9 was forced to pit for repairs which resulted in Evans dropping a lap down and receiving a five‑second time penalty for the contact. Rather than retire the car Evans and the team used the remainder of the race to learn as much as possible for the part two of the double header.
Meanwhile, Cassidy and the team also had a challenging race. In the initial phases Cassidy and his Jaguar I‑TYPE 7 looked strong, but quickly faced technical difficulties which significantly affected his performance.
Managing the issue, Cassidy and team did their best to minimize the loss of positions and in the end just missed out on championship points, finishing P11 at the end of what was a difficult race.
For the second race of the weekend, Evans and Cassidy would start in P15 and P17 respectively as the result of a poor Qualifying session for the team.
Fortunately the pair managed to negotiate the opening laps of the second race without trouble. As the cars ahead battled for position, Cassidy and Evans made use of their Attack Mode activations – extra power and 4WD ‑ to climb through the field and up into the top ten.
On Lap 16, Cassidy took his second Attack Mode deployment before the rest of the grid to crucially take track position and move into the top three. Cassidy dropped to P7 in the closing stages as other cars took their second use of Attack Mode, but the highly efficient Jaguar I‑TYPE 7 and trademark drive from Nick ensured he finished Round 4 in fifth position, bagging 10 valuable points in the process.
Teammate Evans was also making significant progress through the field. Evans had moved up from P15 into the top eight, with an energy advantage to cars ahead and his second Attack Mode deployment still to use, the final stage of the race looked very promising. Unfortunately, a brake by wire failure forced him to retire ending arguably what would have been a notable and impressive drive through the field.
Following Round 3 and 4 of the season in Saudi Arabia, Evans sits 7th in the Standings, with Cassidy down in 14th.
Formula E now enters a brief hiatus before resuming on April 12th in Miami for Round 5.
Header Image: Jaguar TDS Racing
