Besides some soreness, Carlos Sainz did not suffer any injuries in his wild roll in Thursday’s Island X Prix #1 Final. As such, he has been medically cleared to compete in the second round of Extreme E‘s Sardinia doubleheader this weekend, though his ACCIONA | Sainz XE Team will have to use the series’ test car rather than the main vehicle due to substantial damage.
Sainz’s Island X Prix #1 ended just moments after it began when he was clipped by Rosberg X Racing‘s Johan Kristoffersson as they merged from the multi-lane start, causing his #55 car to flip before landing on its roof. He was extricated from the overturned vehicle and was reportedly in good spirits but was transported to Cagliari’s Misericordia Hospital for additional medical evaluations before being released. The wreck resulted in a red flag to ensure proper and safe extraction, and RXR would win the race before receiving a thirty-second time penalty for the contact that demoted it to third. Sainz and his team expressed dismay with what they felt was an exceptionally tame punishment for RXR, with Sainz describing it as “one of the most serious actions that I have ever seen without an exemplary penalty.”
The FIA gave ACCIONA | Sainz permission to continue paddock operations beyond curfew to make repairs ahead of the weekend’s second race, with a deadline set of 8 AM on Friday. However, the damage proved to be too much to resolve in such a short period, prompting the team to roll out the test vehicle. Race stewards also allowed Sainz to conduct Friday track reconnaissance with a team member driving him in a UTV rather than on foot, though he got out and walked around for closer examinations. Another curfew break was granted on Friday through 7 AM the next day to “catch up working time”.
“I’m happy to be here even though I’m not 100 percent well yet,” said Sainz in a video released by the team. “We will try to race tomorrow and try to move on. The result was a shame. We could have achieved important things. We were leading at that moment and with a good feeling. Now, time to keep going.”
Team-mate Laia Sanz described the repair process as “quite a mess” though “the mechanics are working hard. We will race with the test car of the orgnisation (Extreme E) as there is no time to get ours ready.”
Extreme E brings a spare ODYSSEY 21 to every event that is typically used by tyre supplier Continental for testing purposes with the series’ Championship Drivers, and teams may use it in races if their primary car is too damaged to take part. ACCIONA | Sainz has been permitted to shake down the car prior to qualifying on Saturday.
Similar arrangements to Sainz’s were given to Veloce Racing’s Christine GZ, who was driven around for her track scouting ahead of the first race to mitigate the effects of her foot injury, and McLaren XE, who received a curfew waiver to address damage suffered in a roll during the Crazy Race. McLaren is also having a pre-qualifying shakedown for its car.