The Biggest Talking Points from the 2026 Sanya E-Prix

Linus O'Howell
4 hours ago
4 min read

In the first of 5 Asian Races in 5 weeks, Formula E returned to Sanya for the first time since 2019!

A Dennis Masterclass

As far as performances go, I don’t think you’ll see many stronger in 2026 than what Jake Dennis managed to achieve in Sanya! After beating his teammate Felipe Drugovich to Pole Position, Jake led a decent amount of the opening part of the Race, whilst also keeping his energy levels pretty strong in comparison to his nearest competitors! Both Andretti’s then dropped through the field, looking out of it, only for Dennis to climb back through into the lead before the Red Flag was thrown! Unfortunately, this Red Flag looked to have cost Dennis the win, perhaps even a Podium, as drivers who were yet to use any of their two Attack Modes were able to take full advantage of having extra power in a tight field! However, despite all of this, Jake Dennis came back through once again to not just win the 2026 Sanya E-Prix, but to win it convincingly! Multiple things went against Andretti and Jake Dennis in this Race, but he looked unstoppable, scoring an iconic win as a tribute to his late Father-in-Law!

Almost an Andretti 1-2!

We’ve spoken about the brilliant Race-winning performance by Jake Dennis, but we’ve only briefly touched on the other Andretti driver, Felipe Drugovich! Whilst not 100% true, Felipe basically followed Jake throughout Saturday, both in Qualifying and in the Race, with him eventually crossing the line in P2 for his second-consecutive trip to the rostrum! As a result, Andretti were able to celebrate a fabulous 1-2 finish, although that would eventually go away with a post-Race penalty hours after the chequered flag had been thrown! The 5-second time penalty that Drugovich received was for a collision with Pascal Wehrlein, but given that I never saw Wehrlein drop through the field (for anything expect his time penalty), this was a weird one!

The Contrasting Fortunes at Cupra Kiro

As far as teammate dynamics go, comparing Dan Ticktum and Pepe Marti’s performances for Cupra Kiro this season are as contrasting as contrasting can be! Pace-wise, Dan is clearly the quicker driver, with him already taking 2 Pole Positions in 2026 (both in Monaco)! However, in the Races, something always seems to go wrong for Ticktum, with Dan consistently getting involved in incidents, whilst Pepe’s results have been incredibly impressive given the fact that he’s a Rookie! Rather unsurprisingly, that’s exactly how things played out this weekend too, with Ticktum qualifying 4th in comparison to Marti’s P18, only for things to completely reverse in the E-Prix! A slight misjudgement in the braking zone saw Dan’s Cupra Kiro fly over the top of Mitch Evans’ Jaguar, whilst a second incident would leave both Cupra’s with damage repairs needed! However, whilst nothing would continue to go right for Dan Ticktum, Pepe Marti flew his way through the pack, eventually finishing second with some penalties for the drivers in front! That’s now 2 Podiums in 3 Races for Pepe Marti, who now finds himself 30 points clear of his much-more experienced teammate!

What Could’ve Been for da Costa

For a lot of the event, Antonio Felix da Costa was nowhere, he wasn’t having any input on who was going to score big points, with him languishing outside of the top 10 completely! However, the FIA’s decision to bring out a Red Flag proved to be perfect for Antonio, with the Jaguar TCS Racing driver still yet to use any of his two attack modes! This allowed da Costa to climb all the way through into the lead of the Race, with it looking at one point that he was nailed on to win here! However, it was then announced that the Portuguese driver had received a 5-second time penalty for “moving under braking”, a result that eventually dropped him from 2nd to 5th (and then subsequentially 4th due to the penalty for Drugovich)! For me, the way that Antonio Felix da Costa moves isn’t rash at all; we see this all the time in Motorsport, so I find this penalty to be incredibly harsh!

A Shocker for the Championship 4

In the build-up to the start of the 2026 Sanya E-Prix, Formula E aired a hype video around the fight for the Championship between Mitch Evans, Oliver Rowland, Edoardo Mortara, and Pascal Wehrlein! The video proved to be quite ironic, with not a single one of these drivers scoring a point this weekend! Mitch Evans found himself in multiple incidents, with him eventually being forced to retire after his car wasn’t deemed safe enough, whilst Oliver Rowland put himself in the wall with just a couple of laps to go! This was a particularly bad error by Rowland, as the Season 11 World Champion had a great chance to close the gap out front! Edoardo Mortara also found himself out for the first time since Round 1 in Sao Paulo, whilst a 5-second time penalty for Pascal Wehrlein dropped the German out of the points entirely! It’s very rare to see top drivers all struggle like this, and more impressively, all for different reasons, too! Jake Dennis now finds himself best of the rest, just 34 points behind Evans (with 6 Rounds to go)!