Nick Cassidy only 17th in Madrid after starting from pole: "Our strategy wasn't too bad"

The 2025/26 season remains a rollercoaster ride for Citroen driver Nick Cassidy: after a strong qualifying session in which the New Zealander secured pole position, Cassidy struggled with the strategy and with Cupra Kiro driver Pepe Marti in the race. After a collision on the final lap, he only finished 17th in the end.

Nick Cassidy has experienced an absolute rollercoaster ride in the first six races of the twelfth Formula E season. So far this season, Cassidy has either been successful in qualifying or in the race. He has not yet managed both together.

This pattern was once again evident in Madrid: Cassidy finished third in qualifying Group B and then won the duels against Edoardo Mortara and Norman Nato. He even beat Nyck de Vries in the final and secured his eighth pole position - the first for Citroen Racing since the Formula E entry before the season.

Successful qualifying, sobering race

In the race, the New Zealander then drove in the leading group for a long time and even led for eight laps, but only came in late for his pit boost stop. A decision that would prove to be his undoing: The two Cupra Kiro drivers in front of him saved energy before their pit stops and held up Cassidy in the process, who lost a lot of ground as a result. After the pit boost, he was suddenly only eleventh, seven seconds behind race leader Antonio Felix da Costa.

Thanks to his attack mode, he fought his way back up to fourth place, but lost ground again in the final four laps. He went into the final lap in twelfth place, but only finished 17th in the end.

"To be honest, our strategy wasn’t too bad," Cassidy told e-Formula.news after the race. "The Kiro cars were significantly slower than expected on the run to the Pit Boost, and Martí’s issue on the way into the pit lane cost us around 2.5 seconds. That effectively dropped us from what could have been around seventh to about 12th."

Positive development despite another setback

"It’s always easy to look back afterwards and say we should have stopped earlier or later," he continues. "But I expected the others to read the race well too. There was also some contact with Nato on the final lap."

Despite this, Cassidy draws a positive interim conclusion: "But if you look at the bigger picture, after six races we’ve had a win, a pole position and a podium — all on different weekends. That’s been a very successful start, more than I expected. It also takes some of the sting out of days like today, because overall the season has been very positive. Our qualifying performance has improved as well. We’ve reached the duels three times in the last four races, so that’s another step forward, and hopefully we can keep getting stronger."

After just over a third of the season, Cassidy is in fifth place in the overall standings with 51 championship points. The next opportunity for the New Zealander to collect more points will come in just under six weeks' time at the Berlin E-Prix on 2 and 3 May.