Marrakech E-Prix: Mortara wins to take Formula E points lead

The Swiss driver collected his third victory of the season in a tentative Morocco encounter, where hot conditions ensured that teams were seeking to stave off the threat of overheating batteries - and thus precipitated an uncharacteristically early trade of attack modes among the front-runners.

Mortara had preserved his second place on the grid off the line, having a fleeting look at the inside of da Costa at the start before the DS Techeetah driver closed him off.

The Techeetah squad appeared to try and clear its pair of three-minute attack modes early on, on both occasions providing Mortara with the lead.

After the first Techeetah activations on lap 5, Mortara followed them onto the Turn 3 attack mode zone a lap later, conceding the lead back to da Costa - who largely chained his attack modes together when taking another dose of 250kW on lap eight.

But this time, Mortara hung on for an extra lap before taking his second, which yielded enough of a gap over da Costa to go off-line for his hit of extra power and return in the lead.

Edoardo Mortara, Venturi Racing, Silver Arrow 02

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

From there, the Venturi driver began to preserve his lead, as the Techeetahs squabbled with Mitch Evans and a rapid Oliver Rowland - who had hurled his Mahindra into the upper reaches of the field early on in the race.

But it became clear that Jean-Eric Vergne was preserving his energy for a late push and, after dropping to sixth at one stage, began to rise back through the ranks to return to third - with da Costa ahead.

With Vergne in the championship hunt, Techeetah swapped the cars around. Vergne had an extra 2% of battery charge over Mortara and was encouraged to use it to close in - but was unable to make enough of a dent in Mortara's lead.

Da Costa thus bargained to be allowed past, as Vergne's energy advantage had dissipated, which Techeetah granted to give Mortara considerable pressure towards the end.

But although the Portuguese driver was looming large in Mortara's mirrors, he was unable to claim a first win of the season as Mortara managed his pace expertly.

Vergne dropped considerably by the end of the race, bringing him into Evans' sights for the final lap. On the run to Turn 3, Vergne lifted off very early and caught the Jaguar driver by surprise - but Evans had the presence of mind to nip past and bag a podium.

Lucas di Grassi enjoyed a steady ascent through the field and, although he was passed for fifth late on by Nyck de Vries, the Brazilian snatched the position back on the final lap.

De Vries was unable to provide an answer to di Grassi's late assault despite an energy advantage by the end, but remained untouched for sixth as Jake Dennis was a further 3.6s down the road.

Although Dennis had been among the top five in the first half of the race, the Avalanche Andretti driver had to back off slightly to meet his targets on power, but was himself largely unbothered for seventh place.

Stoffel Vandoorne rescued eighth place after qualifying in a lowly 20th place following braking issues, putting together a well-managed race to enact a push into the points.

The Belgian loses his title lead, and finished ahead of Sam Bird - who in turn was just 0.2s clear of Rowland as the Mahindra driver's early promise was underpinned by a level of energy overconsumption.

Vandoorne's late push dumped Oliver Askew out of the points after the American had started from a season-best seventh place, while Pascal Wehrlein also dropped out of the points as Porsche appeared to opt for an excessive level of energy saving at the start - which ultimately failed to pay off.

Formula E Marrakech E-Prix - Race Results

Cla	Driver		Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval
1	Edoardo Mortara		Venturi	34	46'45.410
2	Antonio Felix da Costa		Techeetah	34	46'47.707	2.297	2.297
3	Mitch Evans		Jaguar Racing	34	46'51.680	6.270	3.973
4	Jean-Eric Vergne		Techeetah	34	46'52.375	6.965	0.695
5	Lucas di Grassi		Venturi	34	46'53.197	7.787	0.822
6	Nyck de Vries		Mercedes	34	46'53.804	8.394	0.607
7	Jake Dennis		Andretti Autosport	34	46'57.494	12.084	3.690
8	Stoffel Vandoorne		Mercedes	34	46'59.951	14.541	2.457
9	Sam Bird		Jaguar Racing	34	47'00.458	15.048	0.507
10	Oliver Rowland		Mahindra Racing	34	47'00.680	15.270	0.222
11	Oliver Askew		Andretti Autosport	34	47'01.746	16.336	1.066
12	Pascal Wehrlein		Porsche Team	34	47'15.453	30.043	13.707
13	Nick Cassidy		Virgin Racing	34	47'17.380	31.970	1.927
14	Alexander Sims		Mahindra Racing	34	47'17.742	32.332	0.362
15	Andre Lotterer		Porsche Team	34	47'17.774	32.364	0.032
16	Sébastien Buemi		DAMS	34	47'19.117	33.707	1.343
17	Oliver Turvey		NIO Formula E Team	34	47'20.428	35.018	1.311
18	Robin Frijns		Virgin Racing	34	47'21.096	35.686	0.668
19	Antonio Giovinazzi		Dragon Racing	34	47'26.297	40.887	5.201
20	Sergio Sette Camara		Dragon Racing	34	47'28.174	42.764	1.877
21	Maximilian Gunther		DAMS	32	44'36.730	2 Laps	2 Laps
22	Dan Ticktum		NIO Formula E Team	28	39'56.472	6 Laps	4 Laps
View full results