MOTORSPORT: Ssshhhh, here comes electric racing

Big test is whether fans like the sound of it
International motor racing is in for a big shock this year ... an electric shock.

In a little over eight months a new fully-electric race series called Formula E will start, spanning four continents in its initial season. The cars will be single-seater open-wheelers capable of reaching 100km/h in three seconds and a top speed of 220km/h – performance equivalent to Formula Three.

They will race in 10 venues around the world, including many major cities – and in the hearts of those cities, on temporary street circuits, often around iconic landmarks.

The race meetings, to be known as e-Prixs, will be over in one day, supposedly to minimise disruption and contain costs – at least for participating teams, whose season budgets will be capped at US$3.3 million (A$3.7 million), although perhaps not the hosts.

Formula E is not going to challenge Formula One in a hurry and the biggest question is whether fans are going to warm to racing cars generating 80 decibels (compared with the standard, but often exceeded, 95dcb).

But there is a lot of genuine business “horsepower” behind this series, unlike the ill-fated A1 GP several years ago. Formula E’s aim is to appeal to the smartphone-obsessed younger generation, stimulate investment in electric vehicles and change their image. The zero-emission series is being strongly backed by the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA), whose president Jean Todt has said it “will offer both entertainment and a new opportunity to share the FIA values and objectives of clean energy, mobility and sustainability with a wider and younger audience”.

London’s Financial Times, which has reported regularly on the progress of Formula E, has said that the e-Prixs “will allow spectators to participate through live, online video games”.

“While watching the event, spectators will be able to race against digital, real-time simulations of the drivers on a tablet or smartphone,” it said.

Even before drivers are announced by the 10 teams – each with four cars (two per driver, interchangeable during races because their batteries initially won’t last longer than 25 minutes in the one-hour races) – Formula E involves many huge names.

The team owners include America’s Andretti clan and a son of Roger Penske, Jay, multiple F1 world champion Alain Prost in association with France’s DAMS, Hollywood actor and environmental activist Leonardo DiCaprio with Venturi Automobiles, Sir Richard Branson and Lord Drayson, an electric land-speed record holder and former British science minister.

Another is Japanese ex-F1 outfit Super Aguri with which Australian engineer Mark Preston is involved.

See full team details here

Among companies committed to Formula E are McLaren and Williams of F1 renown, Renault and Audi (the latter with a team), Italian chassis builder Dallara, Michelin and TAG Heuer. McLaren is supplying the drivetrain and electronics and Williams the lithium-iron batteries.

Renault was a pioneer of electric vehicles, being the first full-range car manufacturer to market zero-emission vehicles.

The Formula E series is being bankrolled by two Spaniards reputed to have committed 100 million Euros – more than A$150 million – to the project.
Enrique Banuelos is a huge property developer while Alejandro Agag, the series chief executive, has a racing pedigree as a successful team owner in GP2 and GP3.

Agag also is the son-in-law of a former Spanish prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar, but the calendar for the first season does not include any Spanish race.
It kicks off in Beijing in mid-September, followed by another in Putrajaya, the federal administrative centre of Malaysia, then three rounds in South America, two in the US, and ends with three in Europe –  including at F1’s crown jewel, Monaco, and the finale in London. Oceania – including Australia – and Africa are said to be on the horizon for the second season or later.

For the first championship at least all the cars will be assembled by French company Spark Racing Technology, but already there are others – including Bluebird of land-speed (and water) fame - making noises about fielding machinery.

“I’m sure teams like Ferrari and Red Bull will be in Formula E one day,” Agag said.

David Richards’ Prodrive and Ryan Walkinshaw, who inherited control of Holden Racing Team from his late father Tom, are eyeing it, and David Brabham has registered a company Brabham Formula E Racing Team Ltd.

Lucas Di Grassi, a Brazilian former F1 driver (with Branson’s Virgin Racing), demonstrated the 780kg, two-gear Formula E car with a push-to-pass boost system in America this week, on the famous Las Vegas Strip.

The lack of sound on the video Formula E posted of that run ( see here ) earned lots of thumbs down.

Di Grassi is certain to be one of the 20 drivers in the first season of the series and there are plenty more of his calibre available.
Frenchman Alex Premat, who raced a Holden Commodore V8 Supercar for Garry Rogers the past two years but won’t be around for its transition to Volvo Polestar Racing this year, did some of the early testing and development for Formula E and must be a strong possibility for a race seat now.

Rupert Murdoch’s Fox television business has the rights to screen Formula E in more than 80 countries.

Boston Celtics NBA basketball owner Wyc Grousbeck and his Causeway Media Partners recently invested in the series and Grousbeck will sit on the board of directors.

Sales of electric road cars so far have fallen well short of targets.

New York-based research firm ABI estimated them to be only 150,000 in 2013 but has predicted they could grow at almost 50 per cent a year from now to reach 2.3 million in 2020.

And consultancy EY has forecast Formula E racing could help boost sales by as much as 77 million vehicles over the next 25 years.
Series CEO Agag has said it will become “the framework for research and development around the electric car – a key element for the future of our cities”.

“We are creating a new and exciting spectacle mixing racing, clean energy and sustainability,” Agag said. “We are convinced that the future of auto motion, particularly in cities, is electric.

“Battery life and efficiency of electric engines are two fields in which many global corporations are investing vast resources. Technological breakthroughs in these fields will take the electric car to a different level.

“We will be the testing ground for those advances.

“We would like to be as big as F1, but our focus is different.”

Professor Burkhard Goeschel, president of the FIA Electric and New Energies Championships Commission, has called it “a milestone for the future of motorsports”.

Sir Richard Branson said “the need to create fast, dependable and durable race cars will help to accelerate the sector and showcase electric cars to a large global audience”.

His team principal, Alex Tai, said it was “the drive to develop new technology” that appealed to Virgin.

“I’ve been fortunate to have been involved in a number of such activities over the years, from the Virgin Atlantic Global Flyer to Virgin Galactic activities that push technological and human boundaries and capture people’s imagination,” Tai said.

FIA president Todt said he was fascinated by the interest in Formula E.

“Everybody has to learn – the competitors, the FIA, the promoters, the commercial partners,” Todt said.

“We must be careful because I really hope the interest is followed by a strong realisation of it.

“The names of the teams will definitely help to create the interest.

“But for me the most fascinating thing is the question marks – how will people react, what will be the noise, how spectacular will it be?

“It is something we don’t know and we have to be careful to create a good expectation.

“It is also environmentally friendly, which is very important because motorsport has to follow the evolution of society. Formula E is part of this development.

“It is a very exciting new category – a vision for the future.”

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