On Saturday, the first race for the FIA’s all new fully-electric series will get underway. The official name for this will be the Beijing ePrix and it will take place on the old Olympic Green used back in 2008. Formula E will be born and motorsport will enter a brand new era, one full of intrigue for a lot of older fans, and one designed at introducing a younger generation into the brilliant world of motorsports.
20 drivers from 10 teams will take to the grid for the inaugural race, the first time that the FIA has introduced a championship since the World Endurance Championship began in 2012, which has since become more and more popular with big names including Mark Webber, Alexander Wurz, Tom Kristensen, Giancarlo Fisichella and Bruno Senna all having notable drives in that series. There is no reason to think that Formula E could not be just as successful within a few years. One thing that Formula E should establish itself as is different from Formula One. The two series will be completely different from the fact that all of the cars are identical down to points being awarded for pole position as well as fastest lap, as well as the timetable for the event, all condensed into one day.
Formula E will have some big names in this series, as well as a few names that will sound unfamiliar to many. Ex-F1 drivers including former race winner Jarno Trulli will be rubbing wheels with IndyCar race winner Oriol Servia and AutoGP race winner Michela Cerruti and WEC race winner Stephane Sarrazin as well as GP2 champion Fabio Leimer. So there are plenty of capable drivers in this category. Some of the teams will sound familiar too as DAMS and Andretti Autosport will both be running teams.
The car has been developed by and is a collaboration project of all of the finest brains from Spark Racing Technologies (SRT) and Formula One giants McLaren, Williams and Renault as well as Dallara who designed the current GP2 and IndyCars. The tyres for the SRT_01E will be pretty unique in that the tyre developed by Michelin will be all-weather tyres, designed to work well but not disintegrate on dry tarmac, but not lose all temperature in the rain to provide grip in tricky conditions. These tyres are a single compound, unlike Formula One or IndyCar and are designed to last the whole weekend as oppose to about twenty minutes as the Pirelli tyres do. The car itself will develop 270bhp which is a decent amount for any open-wheel car, and should reach speeds of 225kp/h – far from slow. Unlike the current Formula One cars, the Formula E car looks somewhat decent.
This time next week… #FormulaE #BeijingePrix pic.twitter.com/3YHepN2dKa
— Virgin Racing (@VirginRacingFE) September 6, 2014
Unsurprisingly, the cars will sound a bit odd, but I believe that they certainly could sound much worse. It is nice to know that these cars will have a five-speed gearbox, and will accelerate from 0-100kp/h in three seconds.
Pit stops are a big talking point in this series too, as each driver will have two cars, one for the first half of the race, one for the second half. Nelson Piquet Jr shows how the unusual pit stop will work. Races are expected to last around 45 minutes and will require one pit stop.
A controversial talking point is the push-to-pass system or FanBoost. In short: you can vote for your favourite driver and the three drivers with the most votes prior to each race will be given a single five-second 40bhp boost to use whenever they choose to. You can vote for your favourite driver here.
The points system follows a similar system to Formula One and other FIA championships. Three points are awarded for pole and two for fastest lap for each ePrix. The series will also feature dropped scores as Formula One used to, with the best nine results from the ten ePrix will count towards the Drivers’ Championship. The Teams’ Championship will consist of all of the points accumulated by a driver throughout the season.
It may end up being a tricky path for Formula E to get anywhere near to the sort of popularity that Formula One currently has, but it seems as if it is certainly on the right path at the moment. These things will take time, but I am definitely intrigued and excited for the birth of a brand new open-wheel category. I do feel that if the FIA listen to the fans, which they don’t do with Formula One, this series can become brilliant, though time will tell. In the meantime, I believe that we should all at least give Formula E a chance. To wet your appetite, here is an onboard from a damp Donington park:
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