Cassidy awarded first New York EPrix win after major crash on wet track ends race early · RaceFans

Nick Cassidy won his first Formula E race in New York on countback after the first EPrix of the weekend was red flagged due to a major accident caused by a sudden downpour.

The Envision driver led the majority of the race before rain suddenly fell on the circuit with 15 minutes remaining. A heavy downpour resulted in all the leading cars aquaplaning off the circuit at turn six, causing the race to be stopped.

Cassidy, second placed Lucas di Grassi and fourth placed Stoffel Vandoorne all piled into the barrier, appearing to take them out of the race. However, race control announced that the final seven minutes of the race would not be run, leaving Cassidy as the race winner after countback. Di Grassi was awarded second place, with Robin Frijns completing a double podium for Envision in third place.

At the start, pole winner Nick Cassidy leapt off the line to hold the lead ahead of Lucas di Grassi, with Sebastian Buemi jumping into third place in the Nissan ahead of Stoffel Vandoorne. Behind, Jean-Eric Vergne hit by Mitch Evans who was caught out in the crunch of the pack compressing into turn two, sending the Techeetah into a spin and dropping him to the back of the field. On the second lap, Nyck de Vries run very wide at the dusty first corner, but recovered back to the track without losing position.

Jake Dennis was the first driver to activate his first Attack Mode at the hairpin from tenth, followed on the next lap by Alexander Sims and Edoardo Mortara ahead of him. Then, Robin Frijns activated his first Attack Mode from fifth, retaining his position, while Pascal Wehrlein also followed suit, dropping two places behind Sims and Dennis to sixth.

Next it was the turn of race leader Cassidy to take Attack Mode and he was followed by third-placed Buemi. Di Grassi inherited the lead, dropping Cassidy to second, while Buemi held onto his third place. Cassidy immediately caught up to the back of the Venturi, who took Attack Mode at the hairpin on the next lap and managed to neatly slot back into second place behind Cassidy but ahead of Buemi.

Cassidy was not pressured for the lead when his extra energy allowance expired. With around half of the race time elapsed, Buemi took his second Attack Mode, dropping him to fourth place behind Stoffel Vandoorne. Then Cassidy took his second a lap later, dropping him behind Di Grassi into second place. Di Grassi relinquished the lead back to Cassidy when he took Attack Mode, but rejoined behind Vandoorne. This allowed the…