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New York FE: Buemi's first win since '17, Vergne part of late crash

Nissan e.dams' Sebastien Buemi won a chaotic ABB FIA Formula E race in New York, while Jean-Eric Vergne had his standings lead cut after he was involved in multiple crashes

Buemi led the race throughout after starting on pole, but he had to withstand intense pressure from a series of rivals.

First, Jaguar's Alex Lynn pressured Buemi throughout the first half of the race after he had shot past Pascal Werhlein from third on the grid on the run to Turn 1.

Lynn took an aggressive approach to his attack mode activations, using both within the first 14 laps of what would become a 36-lap event, but Buemi covered him each time by taking his own activations one tour later on each occasion.

But Lynn's challenge ended when he lost drive heading towards the Turn 10 hairpin and he pulled over a few corners later, which triggered a safety-car period as he was stranded in his car.

At the restart, Buemi led BMW Andretti driver Alexander Sims and Daniel Abt, who had been following the top two in the early stages, making it a four-way pursuit for first place.

Sims attacked Buemi going into the first corner as racing resumed, but soon found himself under pressure from Abt as the Audi driver took his second attack mode activation at the end of the race's second third.

But as Abt attacked Sims at Turn 2 he went wide and lost several places, which promoted Jaguar's Mitch Evans - who had risen stealthily from 13th on the grid - into third, and that became second when he deposed Sims with a barging dive to the inside of the tight Turn 6 left-hander on lap 27.

Evans then closed in on Buemi but a mistake at Turn 6 a few laps later cost him ground and he found himself defending against Antonio Felix da Costa - who had passed Sims - for the rest of the race.

That meant Buemi came home 0.932 seconds clear to claim his first FE win since June 2017, with Evans successfully holding da Costa at bay.

Sims took fourth ahead of Lucas di Grassi, who had battled his way up the order from 14th on the grid - taking advantage of the first incident involving Vergne.

On the second lap, Sam Bird tapped Jose Maria Lopez into a spin at Turn 7 as Bird ran side by side with Lopez's Dragon Racing team-mate Maximilian Gunther, with Bird later picking up a 10-second penalty for causing the incident.

Lopez's half-spun car meant the drivers behind had to slow and Vergne, who had dropped from 10th to 12th on the first lap, picked up nose damage as he was forced to brake, and was then hit from behind by his team-mate Andre Lotterer.

Vergne came in to change his nose and ran at the rear of the field - ahead of Lotterer, who came in for his own repairs after trying to stay out and hitting the barrier on the outside of Turn 2 with his front wing wedged underneath his car - until the safety car came out.

In what was a chaotic finale for those behind the leaders, Vergne climbed into the points, taking advantage of his remaining attack mode activation compared to many of the others.

But at the start of the final lap, Vergne dived to the inside of Venturi's Felipe Massa at the Turn 1 switchback and the pair made contact, with Vergne forced deep but still alongside Massa.

They came together at Turn 2, with Vergne hitting the wall on the inside, heavily damaging the front of his car again and spinning Massa.

The following cars - Lotterer and Stoffel Vandoorne - hit the stranded Massa and Vergne, with Jerome D'Ambrosio smashing over the top of Massa's car.

They were able to escape, but Vergne had to crawl to the chequered flag, falling to 15th and finishing over 90 seconds behind Buemi.

Vergne's lead is now down from 32 points to 22 over di Grassi, with Evans and Buemi three and four points further back respectively.

Those four are now the only drivers still in contention for the title in Sunday's final race of the season.

Abt eventually finished sixth ahead of Wehrlein, with Bird ending up eighth once his penalty was applied.

D'Ambrosio managed to take ninth despite his drama, with Oliver Turvey rounding out the top 10.

Result - 36 laps

Pos Driver Team Car Gap
1 Sebastien Buemi e.dams Nissan 46m16.399s
2 Mitch Evans Jaguar Jaguar 0.932s
3 Antonio Felix da Costa BMW BMW 1.216s
4 Alexander Sims BMW BMW 2.971s
5 Lucas di Grassi Audi Audi 3.537s
6 Daniel Abt Audi Audi 4.380s
7 Pascal Wehrlein Mahindra Mahindra 6.543s
8 Sam Bird Virgin Audi 13.829s
9 Jerome d'Ambrosio Mahindra Mahindra 23.719s
10 Oliver Turvey NIO NIO 25.038s
11 Gary Paffett HWA Venturi 27.831s
12 Jose Maria Lopez Dragon Penske 34.729s
13 Stoffel Vandoorne HWA Venturi 50.564s
14 Oliver Rowland e.dams Nissan 1m23.962s
15 Jean-Eric Vergne DS Techeetah DS 1m34.508s
16 Felipe Massa Venturi Venturi Accident
17 Andre Lotterer DS Techeetah DS 1 Lap
- Maximilian Guenther Dragon Penske Accident damage
- Edoardo Mortara Venturi Venturi Accident damage
- Alex Lynn Jaguar Jaguar Power Unit
- Robin Frijns Virgin Audi Electrical
- Tom Dillmann NIO NIO Accident damage

Drivers' standings

Pos Driver Points
1 Jean-Eric Vergne 130
2 Lucas di Grassi 108
3 Mitch Evans 105
4 Sebastien Buemi 104
5 Antonio Felix da Costa 97
6 Andre Lotterer 86
7 Daniel Abt 84
8 Robin Frijns 81
9 Sam Bird 73
10 Jerome d'Ambrosio 67
11 Oliver Rowland 63
12 Pascal Wehrlein 58
13 Edoardo Mortara 52
14 Felipe Massa 36
15 Alexander Sims 36
16 Stoffel Vandoorne 31
17 Maximilian Guenther 20
18 Alex Lynn 10
19 Gary Paffett 8
20 Oliver Turvey 7
21 Jose Maria Lopez 3
22 Nelson Piquet Jr. 1
23 Tom Dillmann 0
24 Felipe Nasr 0

Teams' standings

Pos Team Points
1 DS Techeetah Formula E Team 216
2 Audi Sport ABT Schaeffler 192
3 Nissan e.Dams 167
4 Envision Virgin Racing 154
5 BMW i Andretti Motorsport 133
6 Mahindra Racing 125
7 Panasonic Jaguar Racing 116
8 Venturi Formula E Team 88
9 HWA Racelab 39
10 Geox Dragon 23
11 NIO Formula E team 7


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