Race Reaction
Pascal Wehrlein was discharged from a local São Paulo hospital on Saturday evening after getting checked out following his huge accident with Nick Cassidy that triggered the second red flag. Talking through the incident with Formula E Notebook, Cassidy said that “an outcome like that absolutely sucks. From what I’ve heard, he’s okay. I haven’t been able to see him.”
“I felt like I was a passenger,” added Cassidy. “Things were tight between us, but on top of that, I had no steering. It’s terrible for him. It’s terrible for me. Just really, from what I hear, he’s okay. And I’m really glad to hear that.”.
Mitch Evans equalled Sebastien Buemi and Lucas di Grassi’s shared record of most Formula E victories (13) by winning his second São Paulo EPrix, the first ever time a driver has started last and come through to win.
Talking about his race Evans said that it was “a wild race” and that he “got 10 cars on the first lap, or two laps maybe, so that really changed my race quickly, because I was starting to get into the mid-pack and I started to shift my focus to try and optimise this race even more.
“But once guys started doing Attack Modes, it was quite eye-opening how much progress people were making. I just wanted to obviously try and be clever with that, without none of us have got experience of doing these types of races with that type of contrast between the two power levels. So, just going with my gut a little bit, obviously t we timed it all right and I was energy rich.”
Formula E debutant Zane Maloney told FEN that he believed points were on offer before a drive-through penalty (for overpowering) compromised a race in which he briefly ran fifth but was ultimately classified 12th in his Lola-Yamaha.
“To be honest everything was going to plan but it’s the first race for the team, for the manufacturer, Lola,” said Maloney. “But everything was going really well. We are a bit unlucky with the red flag, the timing that they were wasn’t great for us. Then we had the drive through for the overpower, which ruined our race. Having said that, that’s expected for the first race for a new team, new manufacturer and those things are going to happen.”
The new-look CUPRA KIRO team scored its first points of its existence with Dan Ticktum’s eighth position finish. Ticktum reckoned he could have got among the McLaren’s had it not been for losing his second Attack Mode time due to it corresponding with the first red flag of the race.
“Overall, an average weekend,” said Ticktum, before adding that “it’s very positive that the team pulled everything together, and I’m happy to have a car that I can fight with.
“I lost about two minutes in Attack Mode, right at the point where we were supposed to start pushing, which was very, very unfortunate. With the four-wheel-drive, Attack Mode is now very powerful, and it was just a shame. I think we could have had a top five today – the McLarens were very lucky with energy saving and then with the Red Flag.”
Tough Days at the Office
Jake Dennis said that he was unaware of the issue that stopped his car which emitted smoke and then stopped on track in a rare red status meaning a slam-dunk red flag to make the Andretti Porsche safe.
“We don’t know what the issue was, to be honest, the cars only just got back 15 minutes ago, so we’re still investigating,” Dennis told The Race. “Obviously it was a failure of some sort. We just need to figure out what that was.”
Dennis’ team boss Roger Griffiths confirmed that a full investigation would take place and said that “we know that the car wont roll and that could be because the rear brakes have locked on or because something internally failed within the power train.
“At this stage it’s a little early for us to come to any conclusions, all we know is we lost power, we didn’t have any brakes, we then got a red light on the car. We saw a low isolation, or a critical isolation from the battery, but on that we don’t know anything more yet.
“Certainty if it’s something to do with the power train this will be a first for us. All these powertrains were run in Jarama and run reliably. They did quite a few kilometres there, and there was no indication that there was a problem. At this stage we are still investigating so it would be wrong of me to draw any kind of conclusions.”
Robin Frijns rued not starting the São Paulo EPrix when he was unable to move away from the grid in his Envision Jaguar. The Dutch ace told FEN that “the dash and everything was fine but then the brake-by-wire was not activating. I was power cycling and it didn’t want to go in to drive and issues were bunching up together but we still don’t know what the actual issue is at the moment.”
Eye on the Future
Several meetings between manufacturers and teams have already taken place in regard to match ups for the Gen4 era which will begin at the end of 2026. Match ups between independent teams and manufacturers is likely to be more complex than ever for Gen4 due to general paddock relationships between some entities and the recent model of Porsche supplying two teams becoming reality.
FEN has discovered that a version of the Gen3Evo was used for initial Bridgestone tyre testing for Gen4 spec tyre options recently. This followed tests in August in Europe in which it is believed that current Formula E broadcaster James Rossiter carried out the running for the Japanese tyre manufacturer that won the tender to supply in 2023.
The first development tests of the actual Gen4 car for manufacturers are likely to take place in late summer 2025 with the first manufacturer cars being delivered in July. A test mule car could be running after the Mexico City EPrix next month with a testing schedule in Spain throughout January and February planned.
Driver/Team Catch-Ups
Jean-Eric Vergne told FEN that he does not like the two customer team model that Kiro and Porsche have brought to Formula E this season.
“I’m not a big fan of a manufacturer giving the powertrain to more than one team like because it basically brings a team at a very high level that probably should not be at this level,” said Vergne. “But it’s also very smart from them to have made a deal with the best powertrain, but it certainly will make our life a lot more difficult, that’s for sure.”
CUPRA KIRO deputy team principal Russell O’Hagan told FEN that he believes Dan Ticktum has the capacity to bring ever stronger results to the new-look team.
“He’s (Ticktum) established, and I think on one lap pace, he’s a superstar,” said O’Hagan.
“I think over a race, yes, big results are super possible. What that looks like, we don’t know, but he has a lot of mental capacity and he’s good under pressure. He’s good at reading races. I think that’s fine. We would all like to hope that there’s a podium opportunity between one of the drivers at some point in the season.”
Sergio Sette Camara told FEN that his preferred option for a reserve role was always Nissan as he re-calibrated his career after being ousted from the CUPRA KIRO team when they took Porsche affiliated driver David Beckmann.
“Obviously, I wanted to be with a manufacturer, and Nissan was top of my list,” said Sette Camara. “Then, when my managers called, and they said, the first team that appeared as a reserved option was Nissan’ I said, ‘well I then don’t speak to anyone else, because it’s with them that I want to be.”
Andretti’s Roger Griffiths got birthday surprises in São Paulo on Friday when the Formula E Teams and Manufacturers Association members spontaneously broke out in to a rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ as he celebrated another trip around the sun. His serenading misery was compounded by Nicki Shields and Andre Lotterer doing the same on live TV!
“The team principals won’t win the Eurovision Song Contest!” Griffiths told FEN. “It’s my birthday today and they all sang happy birthday, it was an awful rendition but quite touching!”
FEN Growth News!
Formula E Notebook celebrated its first birthday last month with some of its best ever viewing numbers, including a record social media number of 370,000 views on a single post and 17,000 likes for an 11th October look at pit boosting. Additionally, FEN achieved record Twitter impressions of 72k and 2,500 engagements from a post on November 27. FEN will continue its free model of free accessibility in the 2024-25 season thanks to its partners at AVL Racetech, RACEON, Spacesuit Media and founder Sniffer Media Ltd.
FEN has also expanded as it welcomes recently graduated Automotive Journalism talent Georgia Williams to the team this month. She joins FEN founders Sam Smith and Alice Holloway.
