The Portuguese had surged from 11th on the grid to issue into the main battle, taking the lead from Nick Cassidy on the 24th lap with a courageous outdoors go within the flat-out Flip eight earlier than motoring off into the gap.
With sufficient of a result in take his second and last assault mode, da Costa missed one of many three activation loops and haemorrhaged a part of his result in the chasing Vergne, nonetheless with a minute of 350kW left to take.
Two laps later, da Costa went once more and this time got here up for air with assault mode efficiently triggered, however Vergne swept into the lead in his bid to win a second race on the bounce.
The Porsche driver didn’t hand over the struggle, looming giant in Vergne’s mirrors over the ultimate laps and utilizing the slipstream to get stage on power together with his former DS Techeetah team-mate.
On the primary of the 2 added laps, da Costa managed to finish a carbon copy of his transfer on Cassidy and swept into the result in enthral the sell-out Cape City crowd.
It was a matter of closing out the race from there and, as soon as da Costa had warded off Vergne at Flip 10 on the finish of the beachfront stretch, the 2019-20 champion might cross the road for a well-known victory.
Jean-Eric Vergne, DS Penske, DS E-Tense FE23
Picture by: Alastair Staley / Motorsport Images
Da Costa and Vergne had moved up into the highest three following Maximilian Guenther’s lap 21 crash as he hit the wall at Flip 1. Because the Maserati MSG driver pulled as much as cease, a full-course yellow interval was launched simply because the main pair of Cassidy and Sacha Fenestraz collected assault mode.
Whereas Cassidy held on, Fenestraz misplaced positions to da Costa and Vergne on the introduction of the quick yellow-flag interval whereas Guenther’s automobile was cleared from the Flip four/5 chicane run-off.
This opened the door for da Costa to proceed his compelling cost via the sector, with Cassidy falling to his gutsy transfer.
Vergne was effusive in his reward of da Costa’s transfer, and needed to be content material with second regardless of his makes an attempt to discover a well beyond on the ultimate lap.
Cassidy accomplished the rostrum after main many of the last two-thirds of the race, and though the New Zealander fell behind polesitter Sacha Fenestraz, the Franco-Argentine driver crashed on the ultimate lap to permit Cassidy to assert a second podium on the bounce.
Extra to comply with
Cape City E-Prix Outcomes:
