NIO Formula E Team: New York City ePrix Report

The NextEV NIO Formula E Team raced this weekend in New York, as the FIA Formula E Championship made history becoming the first series to host a race around the streets of The Big Apple. The location in Brooklyn gave drivers incredible views of the Manhattan skyline and The Statue of Liberty as they snaked around the city roads on a specially designed 10-corner circuit.

Nelson Piquet Jr and Oliver Turvey lined up on the fourth row of the grid on Saturday after qualifying in seventh and eighth respectively for the first of the weekend’s two races. After a challenging race for the team, during which both drivers suffered from powertrain issues, Oliver was able to put in a strong drive to take the chequered flag in sixth, collecting eight championship points, while Nelson finished just outside of the points in 11th position. 

In Sunday’s 49-lap race, Oliver started from the fourth row of the grid in seventh, while Nelson was forced to begin at the back after being handed a grid penalty for changing an emotor on his car. Both drivers fought hard in the race, with Nelson recovering well from the back, but the team suffered similar powertrain issues to Saturday and Nelson was also handed a drive through penalty in the late stages of the race due to a pitstop time infringement. The race ended with Oliver in 14th position and Nelson in 16th.

The season finale of 2016/17 FIA Formula E Championship will take place in two weeks in Downtown Montreal, Canada. The weekend will take the format of another double-header, with the two races taking place on Saturday 29 and Sunday 30 July.

Nelson Piquet Jr (Car #3) 

“Yesterday was a frustrating day because we had a decent qualifying session so we were hopeful of a strong race result, but we dropped back through the field in the race due to powertrain issues. Today, we knew that getting a result after starting from last today due to the emotor change was close to impossible. We are going to have to see if there’s anything we can do for Montreal regarding the powertrain issues so we can improve our qualifying and race results.”

Oliver Turvey (Car #88) 

“We have struggled a lot this weekend with thermal issues and with the powertrain, and that has been frustrating. It was even more difficult today with the hot temperatures due to the race starting earlier and the longer race distance. I was happy to finish P6 yesterday, which was the best we could have done, and score eight points, but it was a shame that we couldn’t get anything out of the race today.”

Gérry Hughes, Team Principal

“It is fair to say that this has been a very difficult weekend for the NextEV NIO Formula E Team. Yesterday, both drivers had powertrain issues, which made it very difficult to maintain a consistent pace throughout the race. Today, whilst Oliver capitalised on the pace of the car in qualifying to line up 7th on the grid, we struggled with race pace for both drivers this afternoon. With one double-header race event remaining, we will regroup and focus forward on Montreal.”