Handling issues holding back e.dams - Buemi

©DPPI / François Flamand

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Sebastien Buemi was able to celebrate another podium success in last week's Santiago ePrix after finishing in third place in Chile, despite experiencing a recurrence of unexplained handling issues from earlier in the season.

Saturday's podium was on top of a second place finish in the previous event in Marrakesh. The 29-year-old Swiss driver is now up to fourth place in the ABB Formula E drivers championship standings.

Buemi was part of an all-Renault top three in Santiago. However, the former Toro Rosso driver was not happy to see the factory e.dams squad beaten by both customer Techeetah cars.

“I’m disappointed to be behind the customer team," he admitted. “It shows we need to be pushing to be back in front.

"They’ve done an amazing job and it’s right to congratulate them," he added. "It’s the first one-two in the history of Formula E and they deserve that."

Speaking after the race, Buemi revealed that handling issues had put him under pressure from Felix Rosenqvist and Sam Bird in the second half of an eventful race.

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“I didn’t have the pace,” he told Motorsport.com. “I had to fight again to keep them behind, it was tough.

"Driving the car through the corners we don’t get the tyres to work properly," he explained. "It’s costing lots of laptime and energy."

“In the first few laps I was really quick," he continued. "[But] the second part of the second stint I had exactly the same problem as Hong Kong, which I thought we had fixed.

“We really need to get on top of that because that’s holding us [back].”

E.dams has won all three Formula E team championships since the series began. However at the moment it's only fifth in the standings - 45 points behind current leaders Techeetah.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.