WEHRLEIN WRAPS UP SEASON WITH FOURTH OVERALL
Pascal Wehrlein crossed the finish line for the 16th and last round of the 2023 FIA Formula E championship, the Hankook London e-prix, in tenth place, equaling the previous day’s result and wrapping up his effort this year with a total of 149 points which secure him fourth place in the drivers’ standings. Yet this is not the result the Monaco Increase managed driver could have hoped for after winning three rounds out of sixteen (the Diriyah double-header in Saudi Arabia plus another win in Jakarta) and climbing four times onto the podium. Wehrlein had led the overall classification until June and regularly out-classed his team mate Antonio Felix Da Costa, who is a reputed driver with lots of experience. Yet from Portland race onwards, the works Porsche team’s fortunes began to decline as the car seemed to lose competitiveness while competition grew. At the end of the season, TAG Porsche ranks fourth overall with 242 points in total. 61 percent of those points have been brought home by Pascal Wehrlein who now will regroup with the team to find the best condition ahead of the next Formula E season.
The race itself was quite uneventful, apart from the start being delayed by a record 90 minutes because of bad weather. Drivers ventured several times onto the track behind the safety car, only to find out that conditions were reputed too treacherous (Formula E car use all-weather tires) to start a race. Thus the event was red-flagged every time and real action only started around 19:30 CET when nine laps out of 34 had already gone by as recce distance. Wehrlein had qualified 10th on the grid and kept the position at the rolling start, then climbed up one having chosen to delay his Attack Mode phases until Lap 16. He served both 6 and 2 minutes periods consecutively and managed to save a lot of energy; yet, that wasn’t enough to attack Ticktum in front of him and the short track didn’t help. At the end, Wehrlein settled for 10th and gained yet another point to stay securely ahead of veteran Jean-Eric Vergne in the points standings.