Edoardo Mortara leads the way in Sanya as Formula E returns

It is finally here: Formula E has returned to Sanya after a seven-year absence, and the machines were pushing the limits from the very first moment. Edoardo Mortara was the man to beat, putting his Mahindra Racing car at the top of the timesheets with a 1m05.616 effort. It was a proper show of pace, leaving him one tenth ahead of Andretti’s Jake Dennis, who managed to split the Mahindra pair in the final minutes.

Behind them, Nyck de Vries secured third for Mahindra, while Pascal Wehrlein brought his Porsche home in fourth, followed by Norman Nato in the Nissan. It was a wild, messy start for many; the track clearly bite back, with Pepe Marti, Norman Nato, and Antonio Felix da Costa all having their own near-misses at different corners. Sebastien Buemi even forced a red flag after stopping on track, showing just how unforgiving this circuit can be for a field where 11 drivers had never turned a wheel here before.