The Haitang Bay circuit hosted round 11 of this season this weekend, resulting in some valuable points for Maximilian Günther and Taylor Barnard.

Just as was the case seven years ago, the Sanya race was full of action. The race was characterised by several incidents, one of which brought out the red flags halfway through before a re-start.

The two DS PENSKE drivers made the most of the second phase of the race to climb up the order, thanks to a clever strategy and excellent energy management in the first half. Maximilian Günther, 14th at the re-start, maximised his Attack Mode to finally take the chequered flag in sixth place. A penalty for one of his rivals meant that the German was eventually classified in the top five, having started from 19th on the grid as the result of another penalty.

Taylor Barnard didn’t quite have the same success as his team mate, but was deprived of his Attack Mode for several minutes because of a Full Course Yellow procedure. The young Englishman was also penalised after qualifying but still managed to finish ninth from 15th on the grid.

With both of its DS E-TENSE FE25 cars in the points on Saturday, DS Automobiles and PENSKE AUTOSPORT underlined their non-stop quest for top results. The whole team is now fully concentrated on the next two rounds of the championship from July 4-5 in Shanghai.

Maximilian Günther:

“Finishing fifth is clearly a great result for us. This excellent points haul is very good for our morale, because it was a truly difficult weekend. I was lacking pace and confidence with the car. On top of that, it was always going to be a complicated race from 19th on the grid. But we made up for that with an excellent strategy, great energy management, and some decisive attacks towards the end. With a bit more success we could have done even better, but this has still been a very welcome return to the front. Well done to the whole team!”

Taylor Barnard :

“I’m feeling a bit frustrated to finish ninth as we could have got a much better result and finished on the podium. The strategy put in place by the team was really good. We were just a bit unlucky in losing four minutes of Attack Mode due to a Full Course Yellow. Now we’re going to focus on the next races and hope to find the success that eluded us this weekend.”