"Accepted that the drivers' title is gone" - Porsche overtakes Nissan thanks to double podium and shifts focus to other championships

After a disastrous Saturday race, Porsche bounced back with flying colours on Sunday and took two podium places in the rain in Shanghai thanks to Pascal Wehrlein and Antonio Felix da Costa. Porsche thus overtook Nissan again in the teams' standings. The focus in the championship has shifted, as the two drivers revealed after the race.

In the wet qualifying session, Porsche had found a good set-up for the rain, meaning that Felix da Costa and Wehrlein qualified for grid positions 2 and 3. After a few laps behind the safety car, Porsche tried to let Wehrlein chase the leading Nick Cassidy with a longer Attack Mode and made a team order telling their drivers to swap places. However, Wehrlein was unable to get past the Jaguar driver, who made no mistakes and showed great pace.

The gaps open up over the next few laps. "I really tried to push", says Wehrlein. "There was a moment in the early stages when the gap was quite small and I tried to close it. But I came off (the track). If I had really taken a big risk, I maybe could have followed, but not really get any closer. I had to accept quite early on in the race that Nick and his team were simply faster today."

Wehrlein goes wide in the background 😮@Hankook_Sport #ShanghaiEPrix pic.twitter.com/gPAryAgZmW

- Formula E (@FIAFormulaE) June 1, 2025

The fact that both Porsche drivers had used significantly more energy during the laps behind the safety car than Cassidy and almost everyone else caused some surprise at the start. When asked about the issue, Wehrlein and Felix da Costa kept a low profile during the post-race press conference. However, winner Cassidy said: "I've already joked with Antonio that every engineer in the paddock will probably have a theory on that. They'll all look at it now and think: What the heck?"

Tyre problems on Saturday: "Definitely something we need to understand"

No points at all the day before, many points on Sunday: While a lot came together for Porsche in the wet, the team struggled with their tyres on the first day of the Shanghai E-Prix, as Wehrlein explained after Saturday's race. "(There is) a lot of graining and pick-up - the tyre flies apart and disintegrates. We knew that the track is very aggressive to the tyres, but it's the same for everyone. It's difficult to understand why our pace is dropping so much this weekend after just a few laps, especially on used tyres."

"We were strong in the first practice session on a new set of tyres, then in the second session on the used set we were almost last," the world champion continued. "Then we put on a new set in qualifying, were almost on pole position, and in the race with the used set we were only at the back of the field. There is for sure room for improvement and it's definitely something we need to understand and do better."

Drivers' title gone: "Would have needed a big miracle"

In the wet, the tyres no longer played a major role. While Nissan came away empty-handed for the second time this season, Porsche scored a total of 34 championship points on Sunday - also thanks to Wehrlein's fastest race lap. As a result, the works team overtook Nissan again in the teams' championship and leads by one point five races before the end of the season. Nissan is currently still in the lead among the manufacturers though. This is where all hopes now lie for Porsche.

After Porsche's zero on Saturday, however, the team has finally written off the drivers' title. "To be honest, our focus has shifted to the teams' and manufacturers' championships," admits Wehrlein. "Even before Shanghai, we had to accept that the gap was too big. We would have needed a big miracle to still get a chance. But without any points yesterday, it just becomes more and more unrealistic." Championship runner-up Wehrlein is currently 68 points behind Oliver Rowland.

While the reigning world champion is talking about a "hard fight until the very end" for the other two world championship titles, team-mate Felix da Costa also confirms: "That's where we put our chips now. It is always difficult to accept when the drivers' title is gone - especially when you can almost take the lead again a month ago in Miami. Things change quickly in this championship. We have to accept that and will try to find the motivation to continue digging."