Antonio Felix da Costa soared to a second career Formula E victory at the Ad Diriyah E-Prix, beating reigning champion Jean-Eric Vergne to the chequered flag.
In a hectic day of racing, da Costa secured pole position for the race, beating NIO Formula E's Tom Dillmann to the top spot in qualifying.
With Dillmann getting excluded from the final result after exceeding power usage in qualifying, however, it was GEOX Dragon's Jose Maria Lopez who started alongside da Costa on the front row of the grid.
Getting the perfect getaway from the pole slot, da Costa led into Turn 1 when the five red lights went out for the race start, with Formula E charging into its next generation of racing, characterised by the all-new Gen2 car.
While da Costa headed the field, Sebastien Buemi had a strong start from third on the grid to jump Lopez, snatching second place away from the Argentinian driver from the get-go.
Struggling for pace, Lopez dropped out of the podium positions with 38 minutes of racing remaining, with Vergne overtaking the driver to claim third before closing the gap to and overtaking Buemi some six minutes later.
Closing in on da Costa, the Frenchman took the lead with 26 minutes of the race remaining.
With Vergne now in the lead, the DS Techeetah driver appeared to be untouchable while his team-mate Andre Lotterer continued to challenge da Costa for second place.
With victory seemingly in the bag for Vergne, the race was cast into a world of uncertainty when the driver was handed a drive-through penalty for exceeding power usage – a punishment that dropped the Frenchman down to fifth place while Lotterer was handed a similar slap on the wrist which relegated him down to seventh.
Fighting back through the field, Vergne soon moved back into the podium positions, overtaking Lopez and Buemi to move into third before the deployment of a safety car which neutralised the race, bunching up the field after Lopez suffered from a left-rear suspension failure.
With the field backed up on the tail of da Costa, lapping behind the safety car meant that any concerns of battery management were eradicated, leaving a flat-out sprint to the finish.
Using Attack Mode when the green flag waved, da Costa led the field away for the final leg of the E-Prix while Vergne cleared Jerome d'Ambrosio through the activation of Attack Mode to move into second place.
As one of five drivers to have been awarded FanBoost for the opening race of the season and with Vergne closing in, da Costa deployed the 5s 100kW boost in power in the closing stages of the race, extending his marginal advantage over Vergne.
After one final push which saw Vergne slice da Costa's lead by an entire second on the final lap of the race, the Frenchman was ultimately unable to clear the Portuguese racer.
This handed the 27-year-old his first victory in Formula E since the 2015 Buenos Aires E-Prix in addition to the lead in the Drivers' Championship, with victory combined with pole position handing the driver a 10 point advantage over Vergne.
In his first race for Mahindra Racing after being forced out of Dragon, d'Ambrosio stood on the final step of the podium in third place, beating Panasonic Jaguar Racing's Mitch Evans who was fourth.
Andre Lotterer recovered from his drive-through penalty to finish in fifth place in the second DS Techeetah car while Sebastien Buemi fronted a 6-7 finish for Nissan e.dams, with Oliver Rowland finishing inside the top 10 in his return race to the all-electric single seater series.
Daniel Abt headed Lucas di Grassi in an 8-9 finish for Audi Sport Abt Schaeffler with reigning Teams' champions experiencing a difficult weekend in Ad Diriyah while Nelson Piquet Jr completed the top 10.
Envision Virgin Racing narrowly missed out on a points finish, with Sam Bird and Robin Frijns finishing in 11th and 12th after getting excluded from qualifying while NIO's Oliver Turvey finished in 13th place after starting in 19th.
In his first race in Formula E, Felipe Massa finished in 14th ahead of Dillmann and Maximilian Gunther who took 16th place.
After starting in fourth place, Stoffel Vandoorne had a difficult first competitive outing with HWA Racelab, finishing in 17th place, just ahead of Alexander Sims who was 18th after being handed a plethora of time penalties.
Edoardo Mortara was the last classified runner, one lap down after crashing at the start of the race while Lopez, Gary Paffett and Felix Rosenqvist failed to see the chequered flag.
With the 2018/19 Formula E season underway, the all-electric single seater series' new chapter of racing will continue on January 12 in Marrakesh.
