Envision Virgin Racing has made many changes ahead of season five of the Formula E Championship. The obvious change being the addition of the majority owner Envision Group. This should improve their chances next season. The team also revealed their new Gen2 livery it will use on their customer Audi e-tron FE05 car this morning.
Formula E- Envision Virgin Racing Formula E
Virgin Racing recently ended their partnership with DS Automobiles and became a customer team with Audi. They also announced that they will pair Robin Frijns with Sam Bird as their drivers for the upcoming season.
We're season 5 ready 💪
Head to our new website to find out everything that was revealed live in Silverstone today: https://t.co/uNhrlqSixd#AcceleratingChange #EnvisionVirginRacing #FormulaE pic.twitter.com/1PxtVXa5e2
— Envision Racing (@Envision_Racing) October 5, 2018
Envision Group
Sylvain Filippi, Virgin Racing’s managing director looks forward to the new partnership with Envision. “We’re delighted to be collaborating with such an innovative, like-minded and sustainability-focused company like Envision Group,” said Filippi.
“For us, Formula E has always been more than just a racing championship, it’s a chance to be truly innovative and help accelerate change towards a better future. As such, we’ve always been passionate about addressing the wider environmental issues and the reasoning behind our Race Against Climate Change program. Now with Envision Group onboard, we feel we can strengthen this message even further.”
New Driver
The announcement of Robin Frijns has been expected for some time now and he is a capable driver. The Dutchman, a factory Audi driver, raced with Andretti in Formula E’s second and third seasons before the team’s technical relationship with BMW led to him losing that drive ahead of season four.
“I’m very excited to be returning to Formula E with Envision Virgin Racing,” said Frijns.
“It’s great to be joining such a strong team and with the work we’ve already completed, it’s clear we have a very good package. We now look ahead to pre-season testing, where we’ll be able to better gauge our on-track performance.”
By signing Frijns, Virgin Racing dropped Alex Lynn after one lackluster season. He couldn’t compete at the same level as Bird. The Briton also raced for the squad in the season three round in New York as a stand-in for the absent Jose Maria Lopez. Virgin Racing managing director Sylvain Filippi thanked Lynn “for all his hard work behind the wheel last season”.
Meet the new @VirginRacing_FE driver @RFrijns… https://t.co/ykD2ULh69n pic.twitter.com/ToIzQ2BpMq
— Virgin (@Virgin) October 5, 2018
Season Five Confidence
With new partnerships, will the new Envision Virgin Racing Formula E team move up the grid? Sam Bird came in third after a long battle with eventual Formula E Champion Jean-Eric Vergne. Bird was happy to be retained with the team for a fifth consecutive season. He hopes that all the hard work done by his new and improved team will be competitive when testing begins ahead of the new season.
Lei Zhang, Envision founder and CEO looks ahead to the upcoming season. Zhang said that the team “will be guided by Franz Jung, the vice president of Envision Smart Mobility and the chairman of the board of Envision Virgin Racing.” Jung has plenty of experience in the automotive industry as a former executive of German brands. Hopefully, for Envision Virgin Racing, this can be their year to take the ABB FIA Formula E Constructor’s Championship.
MAIN PHOTO:
Embed from Getty Images
