2016/17 Components E champion di Grassi completed a distant thirteenth on the championship’s first go to to Brazil, two locations forward of Mahindra teammate Oliver Rowland, after a day by which the Indian producer failed to bother the frontrunners.
It adopted on from a disastrous weekend for Mahindra in Cape City, the place each its manufacturing facility vehicles and the client Abt entries needed to be withdrawn from the race for security causes.
Mahindra has struggled for efficiency with the Gen3 automotive this yr and failed to attain factors in 4 of the six races to this point, with di Grassi’s shock podium within the Mexico opener and Rowland’s sixth-place end in Hyderabad the one events the place the workforce managed to complete inside the highest 10.
Talking after the Sao Paulo race, di Grassi mentioned he anticipated the 2023 FE grid to be carefully matched to one another, explaining that Mahindra faces an enormous deficit to the main producers after the first-thirds of the season.
“Porsche and Jaguar are method forward, and DS Penske and Nissan are nonetheless there, shut [to the front],” he mentioned.
“It is fairly a distinction, I underestimated the variations this yr. I assumed it was going to be a lot nearer.
“In qualifying, you may even do one thing. I took pole in Mexico, however within the race, unimaginable…
“You want tempo and effectivity. There’s a lot for us to enhance and we’re doing our greatest, however it’s laborious and long-term work.
“Even when nothing had occurred in qualifying, if we had a P10 within the quali, ending within the high 10 within the race can be very troublesome.
“Perhaps we’d get a couple of factors, however that will be the utmost we might do. For those who see the efficiencies and quantities of power that the opposite had…”
Lucas di Grassi, Mahindra Racing
Picture by: Andreas Beil
Di Grassi’s Brazil race was made harder by a crash in qualifying which left him in the back of the grid, however all different Mahindra-powered vehicles additionally did not progress to the group phases, with Abt’s Nico Muller the most effective of the quartet in thirteenth place.
Di Grassi defined that Mahindra’s primary weak point is the effectivity of the powertrain, which suggests it usually struggles in race trim in opposition to the competitors.
Requested by Autosport the place the M9Electro package deal needs to be extra aggressive, he mentioned: “London, Rome and Monaco. However we do not know, as a result of the FIA decides the variety of laps, so possibly they arrive in London and say will probably be 50 laps.
“With extra laps, the distinction in effectivity will increase: when the race is longer, essentially the most environment friendly automotive makes much more distinction. We do not know, however I feel London, Rome and Monaco are OK.
“Attaining one other two or three podiums all year long, that is the attitude [goal] on a monitor the place power is much less delicate. Right here, those that had just a little extra effectivity gained a number of lap time.
“When the monitor does not demand that a lot from the automotive’s effectivity, I feel it’s going to give us consequence.”
“This Sao Paulo monitor is maybe the worst of all for Mahindra. For instance, Cape City and this one.
“[Formula E] are attempting increasingly more to make the race a recreation of effectivity, it will get difficult for us.
“[Mahindra] are already interested by subsequent yr. We have already had a number of discussions and subsequent week there’s extra dialogue about what we will do with the automotive.”