James Brown was famously known as ‘the hardest working man in showbusiness’.
Now, Nick Cassidy, who while not been quite as funky as the self-styled ‘Godfather of Soul’, will at least go toe-to-toe with him in terms of maximum attack on scheduling of his time in the next few months. It is a period which looks terrifyingly busy for the Citroen Racing driver.
After São Paulo, Cassidy flew to Kuala Lumpur to take part in the first Asian Le Mans Series races at Sepang in an Inter Europol Competition run LMP2 car. From there he headed for a well-earned break to see family, many of who he hasn’t seen for months, before heading back to Monaco in early January for more pre-Mexico sim work prior to the Mexico City EPrix.
This will be an important race for the Citroen driver as he has always struggled for a result at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez with his record being 13th, 9th, 3rd and 12th in his four visits to the track.
From Mexico City he will go straight back to Europe for the Gen4 test at Almeria before getting another plane back across the Atlantic to take part in the Rolex 24 ROAR test in an Inter Europol Competition LMP2 car alongside Nolan Siegel, ‘Kuba’ Śmiechowski and Georgios Kolovos.
Then it’s back to Monaco for more sim work before getting back on a plane for the Rolex 24 at Daytona itself.
Once the small matter of one of the world’s greatest endurance races is over, Cassidy will dash back to Monaco for more last-minute sim prep before criss-crossing back a day or two later for the Miami EPrix as Formula E hits the Hard Rock Stadium track for the first time.
At some stage in February there will also be Peugeot 9X8 Hypercar testing in readiness for the 2026 WEC season too, just in case he even thought of any part time hours!
At the end of it all though this is one seriously tough schedule for the Kiwi, but it is also one he’s pretty happy with as he probably knew when he signed for Citroen Racing the intensity of the next two months.
“To be honest, when I obviously joined the team, I mainly looked at it from a performance and technical point of view,” Cassidy told Formula E Notebook in São Paulo.
“You kind of step back and go ‘wow’ like obviously the era with Sebastien Loeb and FIA WRC or with ‘Pechito’ (Jose-Maria Lopez) in FIA World Touring Cars you’re like ‘okay, there’s been quite a few world championships here with this brand’ and now it’s up to us and it’s something quite new and different.
“I think being new and different in a fresh discipline in the electric era is exciting. It probably puts a bit of pressure on because you want to continue that with what the brand’s done before.
“But it’s great because you’re starting this chapter with a brand that’s already had experience of winning at top level, which is pretty nice.”
Cassidy is well aware that Sebastien Loeb is a kind of barometer of achievement with Citroen, and the Kiwi has had some interaction with the nine-time World Champion.
“I did a GT3 test with him in the same car with Red Bull and DTM in 2022 because I missed the first race of DTM and he replaced me,” he says.
“We shared the car for testing, which was honestly one of the coolest things in my career. I’m lucky to have driven some cool cars and been in some cool environments, but when you’re sharing a car with Loeb for testing, it’s pretty awesome and I actually learned a bit from him.”
Cassidy will truly be the hardest working man in racing by the end of February but like Loeb, the man he is trying to replicate in a new era of global success for Citroen, there are no limits to how far Cassidy will go to make it work for himself.
One of James Brown’s greatest albums was the 1974 brooding funk of ‘The Payback’. Cassidy will be hoping that his graft and endeavour will be mirrored by a reciprocative title and headline to his efforts over the early knockings of 2026.
