Mercedes breaks Formula E duck as Vandoorne leads finale 1-2

Mercedes claimed its first Formula E race victory in the 2019/20 season finale with a 1-2 for Stoffel Vandoorne and Nyck de Vries at Berlin Tempelhof.

Ex-Formula 1 racer Vandoorne, for whom this was also a first Formula E triumph, was briefly headed by Sebastien Buemi’s Nissan when he took his first trip over the attack mode activation zone, but soon used his additional power to sweep back into the lead.

De Vries spent most of the race battling with Buemi. He couldn’t get past when he used his FanBoost, but made it through with a late dive later on.

Though de Vries – who had saved more energy – then gained on Vandoorne, his team-mate stayed 1.3s clear to take a breakthrough victory that also earned him second in the drivers’ championship in Mercedes’ first year.

Buemi remained third, fending off Rene Rast as the Audi newcomer backed up his Wednesday podium finish with fourth.

Jaguar-bound Sam Bird said farewell to the Envision Virgin team with a charge from 14th on the grid to fifth.

His team-mate Robin Frijns was a top-five runner for most of the race but picked up damage in a late clash with Lucas di Grassi, who finished sixth.

Jean-Eric Vergne fared best of the group one qualifying drivers who started at the back – though Maximilian Guenther was heading for that honour before he was taken wide into the wall when trying to go around the outside of Frijns’ ailing car. That left Guenther 12th.

That allowed Vergne through to seventh, which wasn’t quite enough to allow him to deny Vandoorne second in the standings and give DS Techeetah a drivers’ championship 1-2.

Champion Antonio Felix da Costa made it up to ninth between Alex Lynn and Edoardo Mortara.

Wednesday race winner Oliver Rowland made little progress from the back of the grid and retired late on with a damaged car.

Race Results