Felipe Drugovich has hit the ground running at Andretti since being confirmed as Jake Dennis’ teammate at the U.S entered team earlier this month.
The Aston Martin F1 tester will engage in his first full-time single-seater campaign since 2022 later this year but is already impressing Andretti with his attitude and work ethic.
Team principal Roger Griffiths told Formula E Notebook that “it’s been super positive so far” and that he believed that “stems from the fact that he hasn’t had a consistent racing programme since he won the F2 Championship so he’s really embracing this opportunity.
“That’s all really coming across in everything that we’ve asked him to do, whether it’s on the simulator, the photo shoots, his whole persona and interaction around the track have been great,” added Griffiths.
Drugovich passed his initial Formula E test at Berlin Tempelhof in July when he deputized for Nyck de Vries at Mahindra because of the fixture clash with the 6 Hours of Interlagos.
The 2022 F2 champion scored two points for ninth place in one of the more intense pack-races on the calendar, and Griffiths believes that from a pressure perspective the pre-season test this week is easily digestible for the Brazilian,.
“It’s relatively low pressure here (at Valencia) but I won’t say it’s a relaxed test plan, but also it’s not a race weekend. It’s a good opportunity for really develop the relationships.
“We’re really excited to see how it goes and his attention to detail is very good. I can see that they are going to be the kind of people that are going to push the team all the time in a positive way.”
What’s the Expectation Bar?
Andretti has developed its own trope in recent seasons as something of a one car team.
Since Jake Dennis’ first season in 2020-21 when he partnered Maximilian Guenther when the team was still known as BMW i Andretti, there has been a revolving door on the other side of the garage with Oliver Askew, Andre Lotterer, Norman Nato and Nico Mueller each having a season each in the other car.
Dennis has beaten each of them somewhat easily, but Drugovich’s calibre has brought an immediate sense that perhaps he will be the driver who can contribute more in terms of points and potentially podiums and wins.
At the same time, there are still some calm rationale from the team, as Griffiths explained to FEN.
“We know that from past experience that a rookie season takes a little while to get going,” he said.
“But if he can emulate what Jake did in his rookie year then I think we’d come away from it super happy.
“We haven’t said to him ‘oh you’ve got to get x number of podiums or x number of points and things like that. We’re realistic in our expectations.
“We expect him to be competitive to Jake and we expect for him to be there or thereabouts straight away in qualifying. But the racing is going to take a little bit longer to come I think.
“It would have been a little bit better if his first race wasn’t his home race. A little bit less pressure on him. But he’s an experienced driver and I think he should be able to compartmentalise that and put it to one side.”
