Oliver Rowland, in Nisssan e-4ORCE, was the fastest driver in the first practice session for rounds two and three of the Formula E World Championship, covering the 2.495 km of the Riyadh Street Circuit, Saudi Arabia, in 1.15.400 m. Portuguese driver António Félix da Costa, in Porsche 9XX Electric, finished the program in seventh position, 0.702 s behind the Briton (and 0.062 s ahead of his teammate, German Pascal Wehrlein, who won the opening race of Season 10 and therefore leads the championship).
This is the sixth visit of Formula E to Saudi Arabia and the circuit with 21 corners built in Diriyah, a city in the suburbs of the capital classified by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site). Once again, the ePrix takes place at night, under artificial light, with race 1 scheduled for tomorrow and race 2 for Saturday. In both cases, on the schedule, after independent qualifying sessions at 12.20 pm in Continental Portugal, 37 laps starting at 5.04 pm.
In the debut of the electric single-seater championship in Diriyah in 2018, António Félix da Costa, at the time a BMW-Andretti driver, won. The Portuguese driver retired from the championship’s opening race in Mexico following a collision and is “obliged” to score points, as he aims to fight for the title he won in 2020. This season, on the calendar, there are 16 ePrix.
“It has been a very short time since Mexico and I admit that I had a difficult week and a half. The mistake was analyzed, just as we studied what we did wrong in qualifying and here, on a track where we know we are very strong, it is very important to have two good races,” said Félix da Costa. In 2021, Porsche won both ePrix at the Riyadh Street Circuit, both with Pascal Wehrlein. António, who has another podium finish in Saudi Arabia (third in 2021, in race 2, as a DS Techeetah driver, the team he was champion with), did not score any points (19th on the first day and 11th on the second).
