A technical issue ended the race of Andretti’s Antonio Felix da Costa early when his car stopped out on track following a battle with Abt Schaeffler Audi Sport driver Lucas di Grassi.
The Portuguese driver was able to get his Andretti going again, but any chance of a good result was out the window after being stationary on track for such a long period of time.
He was able to take fastest lap in his second car, but with two laps remaining Faraday Future Dragon Racing’s Loic Duval snatched that away from him after suffering technical issues himself during the race, also having to resort to going for the point on offer for fastest lap.
Da Costa had this to say about the race: “We had a good start to the race and gained a position straightaway. I was feeling good in the car and we had very good energy management; we were running in the top 10 and looking good to get a few more places. Then we had a technical issue with the car and we stropped on track. That was the end of the race for us, really. We came in and jumped into the other car with the goal of going for the Fastest Lap, which we held until a lap or two from the end.”
The Andretti car had good pace early on and was on for some decent points in the hands of da Costa, but the car shutting down and taking a while to reboot was just frustrating for the team according to da Costa: “It’s frustrating because it has been a month of hard work for the MS Amlin Andretti team and to die right there is hard to swallow. We need to regroup and get everyone motivated to go again in Buenos Aires.”
