Prost drives through the shadows
c/o FIA Formula E
So, the inaugural Formula E e-prix has been and gone. I’d expected to hate every cringe-worthy second of it. That high-pitched shriek of the car, setting my teeth on edge and forcing my spine to contort at acute angles in a reaction normally reserved for the sound of nails scraping down a chalkboard. I was prepared to despise the hastily planned and built street track that wouldn’t allow any overtaking, if the cars even got that close given the disparity expected between racing machines. And I didn’t expect more than a handful to limp over the finish line with the dregs of battery left in them, the Duracell bunny doing his very best to keep running inside that wheel that powered the engine, or however the hell they worked.
In short, ever since that video of Lucas di Grassi pulling “donuts” in a Las Vegas carpark emerged however long ago it was, I expected complete and utter farce.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. What I saw today in Beijing got me massively excited for the future of our sport. Was it perfect? No. But was it racing? Was it wheel to wheel, was it gutsy, did I jump out of my seat shouting at the TV? To every question, a resounding YES. It surprised me. And I’m so glad it did.
Are there issues, well yes of course, but what I think is vitally important to take into consideration is the fact that this was the first weekend of a new championship that has been rushed into existence by a governing body and President determined to show it is aware of the need for the sport to show its 21st Century credentials and to prove that it can remain relevant into the modern era and long after we have run out of dinosaur gloop to power our cars.
In Alejandro (Oui Monsieur President, Alejandro, not Alessandro as you managed to call him on the grid) Agag, Formula E has at its helm a businessman, politician and race team owner who isn’t used to failure. What he has achieved in even getting this championship to its first race must be commended because, if we are being brutally honest, this technology is nowhere near ready to be able to showcase what the future really could be.
I have long believed that until such a time as future tech can do the job of current tech, it simply isn’t a viable alternative let alone replacement. As such, seeing the test times come in from Donington had many in the motorsport community scoffing. The Formula E cars were barely over Formula Ford pace and were losing about 10% of their power per lap, meaning with in and out laps included, drivers would only get about 8 timed laps. They were never going to last a full race distance.
And so to the biggest issue the championship has: that of swapping cars mid-race. I don’t think it matters if you are a motorsport purist, a fan of 50 years, a fan of 5 years or someone whose first experience of a motor race was today in Beijing… it just doesn’t work. We are supposed to be living in economical times. The keyword is Austerity. And yet here we are, looking at a situation in which when a car runs out of power, rather than filling it up, we’re told it’s fine to just unbuckle and jump into a new one. It doesn’t and it can’t sit well with… well, frankly, anyone.
Factor in also the green credentials. Forget, for the moment, the fact that it is quite possible the worst advertisement for electric cars that the industry could possibly hope for and let’s instead focus on the bizarre situation in which each team has to double their freight in order to take two cars per driver to every single race. Cars which are flown internationally by DHL. In big, gas guzzling, airplanes.
The concept of the stops themselves are scrappy and ill thought through. They occur in individual garages which are relatively private and almost impossible to cover successfully on television without 20 unique RF cameras and multi split-screen. A minimum time erases some advantage a quick stop holds, and is too arbitrary in a closely fought race as we saw today when mere tenths split the top 6 coming in for their first stops.
I’ve got to say though, that overall I felt this was the only real major issue with the championship. It was rather nice to be sat at home watching from afar, and so half as a fan and half watching on with a critical eye, here are my takes on a few of what will no doubt be talking points over the coming days and weeks.
The inaugural race mid-flow
c/o FIA Formula E
Sound
Thought I’d hate it, actually really liked it. The only problem for me was it wasn’t loud enough. Those at the track say they’re actually far louder in real life than on TV. Ring any bells, F1 fans? The Formula E car sounds like something out of an early 2000s sci-fi futuristic racing game. At least it would if they positioned the mics better and pumped up the volume. I tweeted during the race, and in hinsight it is the one thing that has stuck with me throughout the day, but there were times when I was transported back to playing F-Zero X on the Nintendo N64, or Wipeout on the Playstation. It was high pitched whooshes and whirrs, chattering around corners… with added tyre squeal. I loved it!
Ahhh yes, many of you will say, but what about that god awful music? Again… and perhaps I’ve played too many computer games in my life, but I enjoyed this aspect of the product too. The musical selection was in the hands of the, let’s say interestingly dubbed “EJ” instead of DJ. You can insert your own witty line about controversial noise here. Suffice to say there weren’t any coloured shirts and wild theories on display, just a dude at some decks wearing a helmet that made him look like the bastard lovechild of Dedmau5 and Daft Punk, trying to find the right tunes to suit the mood.
The music was used sparingly and, at least on the ITV4 broadcast we had in the UK, was at the right level in the mix so as not to drown out the cars nor the great commentary team of Jack Nicholls and Dario Franchitti. We had a nice build of musical anticipation from the grid all around the formation lap to a crescendo at lights out. Then we had nothing but race sound until the safety car came out, at which point the music returned. And I’ve got to say that, from my perspective, it really worked. The safety car periods are a moment at which the race is effectively paused, and as such it did feel like we were going back to a menu screen or hitting that pause button on a computer game. Then back to the racing and the sound of the cars until, with two laps to go, in crept that music again. And as the music built over those last two laps, so did the anticipation right to the flag.
It was a great idea and, for this championship at least, I felt it worked really well.
Speed
Cars that don’t sound fast don’t look fast. It is a very simple equation. This equation does, however, have factors that can influence the result. And they’re all to do with camerawork. The long, wide shots of the cars, the overhead down the start-finish stretch, all played out to show the real speed of the cars. And they looked as slow as they are.
But sitting onboard on a street track (as all the circuits will be), using the trackside cams either on a static or quickly panning with the cars, gave an increased sensitivity and an exaggerated feeling of speed.
The solution to this is quite simple. Improve the sound of the cars via better positioning of microphones and simply making them louder in the mix on the world feed and then again in comparative levels to commentators and, when it is used, the music. Cut down the number of wide angle long shots, and keep the action close and engaging.
No, on the straights they didn’t look great. But in the corners and under braking, they looked mega. Particularly side by side, engaged in battle.
As the technology improves so will energy storage capacity, so will speed. If and when this championship takes off, one hopes the regs will be opened up and car manufacturers will enter to showcase their electric credentials, and then we will see the real development race and the true advancement of this technology.
A huge achievement
c/o FIA Formula E
Circuit
It reminded me tremendously of an Indycar style street circuit. I didn’t think we would see any overtaking, and yet we did on almost every lap. It might not have been for the lead (until the very end) but Montagny’s incredible ascent through the field and Piquet and Sato’s many dices were just a few of the fights that kept us enthralled and entertained. When those first damned stops arrived, the top six were split by a handful of car lengths… on a street track! It was incredibly close.
Bear in mind also that this was a brand new championship at its first event. Not only did the organisers have the running of 20 cars to contend with and a global audience ready to mock a single failure, they also had responsibility for the complete infrastructure of the track. That means facilities (from media centre to medical centre, pitlane buildings to toilets, fencing and safety barriers, timing loops, television cables, satellites. This was an absolutely massive effort.
When the lights went out I was reminded of my own nerves as Press Officer at the very first GP2 race at Imola in 2005. It was bedlam. The electronics had all gone to hell on the cars in practice. Our pole sitter’s engine had gone on the way to the grid for the first race. And then everyone’s brakes started exploding. And that was just the car. The organisation had its own issues, but we had just simply turned up and tagged onto the side of an F1 weekend. It was, comparatively, easy.
Formula E ran its own weekend. Everything that is taken for granted at a race weekend had to be done from scratch by an organization that, while all experienced in their own fields, had never worked together and had no idea if this concept would work. They were trying to do it all in a country that isn’t the easiest to work in, and for a championship that relies on social media they were making their debut in a country where Twitter is outlawed.
The safety car seemed incredibly slow as did the reaction to Heidfeld’s crash. Marshals need to be aware of what they can and can’t do in terms of touching these incredibly dangerous cars in the event of an accident, and if they can’t go near the things then safety crews need to be more numerous and dotted around the track to be on the scene faster, with someone trained in earthing these things in every car.
Overall, Formula E did an unbelievable job. If this was the start, the following rounds should be incredible.
Lucas di Grassi celebrates his win
c/o FIA Formula E
Drivers
If the script had landed on a Hollywood director’s desk, he’d have laughed and thrown it in the bin.
Son of one of the all-time greats of Formula 1 is leading the first race of the championship of the future from pole position. On his tail, the perennial underdog, the nearly man, at the wheel of a car owned by a Hollywood megastar, himself the nearly man of the Oscars. They are team-mates in a separate championship, and friends. On the final corner of the final lap they collide, ending both their races in a massive accident.
Pulling through the carnage to win is the driver in whose hands as test driver the championship was taken from concept to reality and without whom the cars would likely not have been close to being race ready. Behind him, the car run by the most famous name in American racing, Andretti. And completing the podium, after a post race penalty nonetheless, the car owned by Sir Richard Branson.
If you were a cynic you’d say it was all scripted. But the quality of the field and the interest in the championship that has led so many interesting people to enter teams has led to such stories simply occurring no matter what result Formula E ends up with. For the most part the racing was hard and fair, and surprisingly so on such a tight track.
Prost was handed a ten-place grid-penalty for the next race for his moment of utter madness with Heidfeld. Frankly, he’s got off lightly. His move was idiotic at best, callous and downright life-threatening at worst. The angle Heidfeld went into the barrier left me with one of those thankfully all too rare lump-in-your-throat moments where everything goes very quiet until you see that movement that lets you know the guy is OK. That Prost didn’t even go and check on his “friend” spoke volumes, and his immediate comments left a sour taste. His later contrition may well have something to do with the fact that, having written as its mantra its social media engagement, Formula E’s new fans had already judged and sentenced the Frenchman before he’d returned to the pits.
Fans are engaged. Their continued faith in the series is crucial. I’m still no fan of the “fan boost” system, particularly if there is no way of showing the folks at home when it is being used, but if it gets people invested in the championship then so be it.
What that crash gave Formula E however was a calling card. That incident has got it onto every news bulletin and every newspaper in the world today. A simple electric race wouldn’t have done that. It’s brilliant publicity!
The Future
Just how far could this go?
Screengrab – Wipeout HD
The thing I’ve kept thinking about today, is just how good this could be. This championship should never have started in 2014. The technology is not ready. But the fact that it has started, and the fact it has started so positively is a tremendous achievement and must make us incredibly excited for the future. The racing of cars utilizing the internal combustion engine did not become what it is overnight. It took over a century. Formula E has taken the first very small step of what could be an amazing future for electric racing.
There is already talk that in the future, tracks will feature charging lanes so as to completely eradicate the need for the car swap mid race. Indeed, Formula E’s safety car is already fitted with wireless charging capabilities thanks to series partner Qualcomm. On hearing that, my thoughts again fly back to those computer games. Those futuristic vehicles, flying through high-tech cities, picking up extra power, using it to boost. I used to love those games. They seemed so fantastic. Totally at odds to the clunky, blocky graphics of the F1 games of the time, Wipeout and F-Zero X were a vision of the future.
And today, perhaps, we took the first step towards that. If that sounds stupid, do you really think those crazy folks who raced those early motorcars from Paris to Rouen in 1894 ever imagined that over 100 years later there would exist the sheer number of car racing championships in the world, from Formula 1 to NASCAR, from WEC to karting, the WRC to Indycar. Why then, is it so silly to think that in 100 years time, those fantastical computer games of my youth might not become reality? And all because of what we saw today.
Electric racing. I’ve tasted it. And it might just be the future.
Georges Lemaître (peugeot 3hp)
Winner of the Paris-Rouen 1894
The Buxton Blog 
The sound was a bit low I agree, the racing was fun.
I am very very curious about the future for this series, it got everything going for it, just look at the line-up.
And the Heidfeld crash was really bad, but it will go around the world and help bring awareness to the series, not the way you want it, but it will bring in some extra audience imo.
I hated every cringe-worthy second of it!
Music? DJ? I guess the Fox Sports guys cut that out with their commercial breaks in the USA? Marshaling reminded me of that awful A1GP China race.
Nicely written Will.
But what is your opinion on the sausage kerbs that were a major contributor to Heidfeld’s heavy shunt. do you think the FIA has to do something about them or even take them off ?
I was at Spa 3 weeks ago and we were just at the bus stop getting ready to leave the circuit when the GP3 crash happened when Tereshenko flew off one of these sausage kerbs
I feel like they could be warnings that something big is going to happen with them…
Yeah I agree, they’re not ideal. The Tereschenko incident was the perfect storm really and I can’t see how it wasn’t spotted before. The first apex at Bus Stop is higher than turn in, and so to make up the difference they’ve concreted an incline to the kerb. Tereschenko was out of control sliding along the grass. The concrete ramp launched him, the sausage kerb gave the additional kick and the twist.
You can’t trust the drivers not to cut it unless you put something there, so what’s the answer? A barrier? Possibly as we see in Monaco for Porsche. Until they find a better solution I guess they’ll stay.
Well I’v always thought that bollards were better. I know that they only last until some imbécile decides to “playstation”, to quote you, the corner, but they are likely to cause damage to the guy who hits hit. And in the event of someone loosing control they don’t launch you into the air. Plus, talking about the chicane at Spa, the kerbs are already high enough and the driver don’t ride them so much.
Of course the perfect solution will never exist but in my view, in terms of driver safety, bollards are better.
Perhaps they could retain the sausage kerb shape on the apex-facing side of the kerb, but have the back side incline much more gradually, say over a few metres. In incidents like these, the car would just drop off the end of the kerb instead of getting launched into the air.
These things are electric and to really make it like a video game surely they can have corner sensors which are triggered when a driver cuts the corner. They can then be penalised with a reduction of say the top 10% of power or so along the next straight (think DRS functionality), allowing the driver behind the opportunity to overtake safely or simply that driver being penalised if on his/her own.
Ohh I like that. if they cut a corner have a light flash and 80% power on next straight.
Thanks for a sensible and balanced review. I think the only point I disagree about is whether or not the series should have started this year. It’s not perfect but the existence of the series will hasten development and the formula has been well designed to allow rapid evolution.
There were actually a number of electric entries, although I don’t believe any made it, from the Chicago Tribune race of the same era as the Paris race. Funny how things come full circle a full century-plus later.
Will….regarding rhe speed aspect. I particiapte in the USF2000 series here in the USA. The speeds of the FE cars is similar to ours. Our cars are much more exciting in person than on TV….just as the FE cars seem to be.
I hope they take your advice on mic’ing and TV angles. I’m a fan and like the peek into the future we got today.
The issue for me was not about the sport, but the way it was broadcast here in America on Fox Sports 1. I think they were afraid that it would not sound loud enough so in all their genius decided to crank up the track volume being broadcast. In theory it may have sounded like a superb idea but they were dead wrong. The cars were so loud that the commentators were being drowned out. They were barely audible, which was unfortunate. Us Americans were treated, or should I say mistreated into listening to what can only be described as cats being boiled alive and at very high decibels – all the commentary & information we wanted to hear was being lost.
The sport in general had action, suspense, times where I was gritting my teeth and the Prost mishap at the end, well, I think my jaw nearly reached the floor until I saw Heidfeld was out of his car and okay.
Fingers crossed that Fox Sports 1 gets a clue and remedies this before the next race….. because all in all….. it could be quite good.
Agree with every word you say here, Will. Almost every journalist I have read so far is full of praise for the new series, which makes me feel a bit sad that that doesn’t happen in F1. Maybe part of the success of Formula E is that the media has decided to take a supportive approach – however when if’s about F1 all we hear is criticism, whining and negative comments.
Food for thought me thinks,
Perhaps this is the future, if that really is the case I am happy not to be around long enough to see it all unfold. Just do a CG version and no will know the difference, or care.
Keep up your good work at what remains of F1.
It was great! And there’s a point to it…if they can achieve greater longevity and speed it will have made a measurable contribution to the technology. I intend to watch every race…
Hey Will,
I liked it too. I also found the “pit stops” to be a little much though.
Also, not sure if it came through on the UK broadcast, but on the US broadcast on Fox Sports 1, the commentary by Dario and the other guy Nicholls was surprisingly muted or over powered by the noise from the track. Made it hard to hear what they were saying.
I was really pleased to see some former F1 drivers in the mix. It
Would’ve been truly great had Trulli (see what I did there) made it beyond the first few laps. Oh well.
You know who they need to get as a driver or better yet, a commentator? Rubens Barrichelo. I miss him.
Anyways, great summation as always.
Thanks!
the thing that baffles me is that electric cars aren’t the future of the automotive industry. the main faults with the series such as the batteries and speed are all issues electric cars have on the road. Many experts believe that Hydrogen powered cars will be the future, because they can be filled up like any normal car at a similar or lesser cost. this bothers me but as far as the series and racing goes, I was excited by the action. it was great racing. car swapping is a massive issue, I like the style of music they played during the race but I know so many people hate electronic music so it doesn’t matter how tastefully its played, it’ll be annoying to those people. fan boost is a gimmick and nobody likes it. The time between races is two months…. any momentum the series has will be gone by November 22. how can there be any strategy too when the series basically tells you how long your pit stop will be? lastly, THE SPEED. will, you commented how to make it look better on tv, and yes that’ll help. but come on, adding gimmicks to cover up a major issue? you can make more powerful MGU because thatll drain the batteries faster. add more batteries and thatll make the cars heavier, and then slower. each lap the cars get slower and slower…. its an issue with electric cars in general and will only get marginally better. technology will get better, yes. but look at the phone industry. companies put BILLIONS of dollars into their R&D over batteries because they will get immediate return on investment through sales in cell phones and laptops ect. if Microsoft, Apple, Samsung, HTC ect haven’t made any strides in this field with all the money they’ve put into it over the last 20 plus years, I doubt edams or Ventrui will.
Hydrogen fuel is extremely costly and tricky to store safely. Aside from a few experts with vested interests I haven’t seen hydrogen fuels been used as a possible large scale solution for quite a while now.
As for batteries, Apple, Samsung etc don’t actually develop battery technology they just buy batteries from manufacturing companies specialising in battery technology. As for your comments on large strides there have been massive strides in the last decade or so.
With phones and laptops as soon as you have more power available you use it. So although phone and laptop battery life might not have grown the power requirements have massively. In the early 2000 4 hours battery life was reserved for only the most high tech laptops now you can buy a MacBookAir with over 12hours.
Granted the 6%per year improvement in battery performance isn’t stunning but it is constant combined with Formula E being a high performance test bed for new ideas and technology in this field means one should hope for around a 10% year on year improvement.
I agree there are problems but they are not insurmountable.
You do realise that “Hydrogen powered” cars are electric cars too?
The difference with a “Hydrogen powered” car is that, as well as the battery there is a Hydrogen fuel cell, generating electricity to keep the battery topped up. A “Hydrogen powered” car is really a Battery Electric Vehicle with a fuel-cell range extender.
So the whole premise of Formula E helping to drive development in electric vehicle technology (batteries, motors, etc.) is completely valid for “Hydrogen powered” cars too, as they contain most of the same technology.
And the other thing you may not be aware of: for all practical purposes Hydrogen is a fossil fuel. It’s not significantly “greener” than petroleum gas. That may change in the future as alternative ways of producing it in volume are developed but, for now, it’s not a viable contender to be a “green” sustainable fuel.
I will note that pretty much all of the “experts” who make these claims about hydrogen are people who are part of, or paid by, the petrochemical industry. They have a vested interest in maintaining the near-monopoly supply chain that currently supports our motoring. Electricity as a fuel destroys their business model, because people can get electricity from all sorts of sources, including local generation (solar, wind, etc.). Hydrogen maintains that reliance on their supply chain and enables them to maintain their business model. Why would they not promote it as the way forward?
Of course, technology is changing and it’s entirely possible that, in the near future, new ways of mass-producing hydrogen emerge which aren’t tied into the petrochemical process. Even better, if these can deployed locally to eliminate the inefficiencies and lock-in of traditional supply chains, even better (good for us, bad for the petrochem. companies) but we are a long way off from that.
In the mean time, plug-in Battery EVs seem to be the best bet. They’re not there yet for most people, but it is the technology which is the most affordable, and which is developing the fastest, and Formula E should help to push the development harder.
And there’s nothing to stop us installing hydrogen fuel cell range extenders onto future models when that technology is fit-for-purpose.
I didn’t love it but I didn’t hate it, either. I was quite curious as to what we’d see and it was better racing than I guessed. Yes, swapping cars was unusual but I think the minimum pit time is needed to make sure the driver is properly belted in. It wasn’t the greatest circuit in the world. They really need to have some intense braking zones. All in all, not a bad debut in my opinion.
Use of modern batteries can be traced back to 1748, use of electric motors to 1740. Anyone who thinks there is much scope for development beyond what is ‘currently’ 🙂 possible is deluded. Electric vehicles are not the future, or if they are it is a very poor future.
Just curious – have you driven a Tesla Model S? I don’t know of anyone who’s failed to be convinced.
No I haven’t but I think the Tesla’s are great cars. I also thought laserdisc was great. The fact is that neither are, IMO, the future.
Battery performance has increased massively since then in size, performance and reusability. Same goes for electric motor technology with efficiency and miniaturisation.
The other poster has a great example, the Tesla wouldn’t be possible, a family car that accelerates faster than a high performance sports car, seats 7 and can cruise over 200 miles.
In the last few years with the explosion of mobile devices and the use of batteries in planes and cars means that if anything this field is actually increasing in progress. How batteries will work and what style or idea will gain hold is open to debate right now but making broad statements like they won’t work are pretty bold.
People once thought steam was the pinnacle of performance, then diesel/petrol. I am not saying we don’t have challenges but of you compare a petrol engine from 1980 and now it’s massively lighter and more powerful and the same is true for batteries. Who knows what serious development in a racing series will do to help batteries take the next leap.
Yes but petrol engines have only been around 100 or so years. Batteries nearly 300. It’s the law of diminishing returns. Tesla is great but not if you want to drive 500 miles!
The first practical battery was invented in 1836 before then some investigation of electricity happened but nothing that had any power capacity at all.
Practical use of the petrol engine was around the same time, however as petrol power and oil became the prime focus (as it was easier to use) that technology took off a little faster.
However your dates are disingenuous for example if you wanted to you could say engines have more deminishing returns as the first examples of internal combustion come from the third century.
In practical terms in the lab they both came on the scene around the same time however batteries have had less development as portability proved hard for many years.
I have no clue what will happen in 50 years but a form of battery power I would say is a better bet than pure petrol/oil engines.
You can manipulate the dates as much as you like. It doesn’t matter as I’m not the one claiming that there is loads more to come from petrol engines. Not once did I say that. In fact I’d agree they have pretty much got to the end of their development too. Equally steam is not ‘internal combustion but if you want to say 3rd century fine, then I’ll have the Baghdad battery which pre dates that by a few hundred years.
All of that is desperate reaching though, which the electric car proponents tend to do a lot of. I’m not anti electric car. I think the Tesla S is great. I’d like one but even if I could afford one I wouldn’t as it would be useless for visiting my friends in Scotland or France, or even Manchester for that matter. There simply isn’t the development potential in batteries for that to change, not unless we can rewrite the laws of physics!
My point was battery technology isn’t three times older than petrol engines they are pretty similar and petrol engines have had a lot more development.
I was only pointing out that your dates where pretty skewed to try and prove the negative facts on batteries to fit your viewpoint. I never claimed internal combustion from the 3rd century (FYI this is internal combustion not steam the Internet has many examples) was a valid argument I just pointed out the example to prove how you can use dates to try and manipulate things to your point of view. I was just letting you and others reading that battery technology isn’t as you claimed three times older than combustion engines.
The format of batteries and how to charge them are important problems however assuming that the entire technology is at a dead end even though battery technology has moved on in terms of power massively in the last decade (about 60% better performance) was disingenuous.
Weather it will succeed on large scale is a question that has many potential problems to resolve however it isn’t helped by people making assumptions.
As for your comments on the range, electric chargers are in short supply (they can give you 130miles in 30 mins) which is a fair point however the official range is 265miles on a single charge with what is really the first generation of commercial electric cars. That will get you you from London to the Scottish border, however if you stop for a coffee and plug in for 20 mins while you take a break you can add close to 90 more miles.
True it won’t be a solution for people who drive 300 miles multiple times a week without stopping for a break but for your average family in the UK 265miles is such a large number it wouldn’t be a factor in 99.9% of their journeys.
I agree batteries have problems, and I am no advocate for batteries being a clean solution (they cost a lot to make etc) however I felt I needed to post something to give readers the other side of the coin instead of the oft repeated batteries are dead view that you and some others have been putting forward.
Technology is spearheaded by competition so we should see what happens when batteries have had a decade of competition. After all petrol engines have had 100 years of intensive competition in racing compared to electric racing.
You seemed to fixate on the date which was clearly not that important though I’d still contend that batteries are older tech than ices but hey ho. The point is they have nowhere to go. You write as though no one was working on them and they were developmentally forgotten whilst turbos and injection was invented. Not true. Portable power has been the holy grail for many an industry for a long time. Submarine power, not just military but oil etc, power tools, heavy industry and plant. Then in the last 20+ years phones, lap tops and tech. And batteries are still rubbish.
I agree that for most people and most journeys electric cars are almost ready. But the thing is Mr average may only need 200 miles 90% of the time but he is not going to splash out on a car that does not fit 100% of his needs. Even when cars can do 400 miles that will still be an issue. As for charging points yes, almost as big an issue as range. Every parking space would need one. The if every car was plugged in an charging generating the power becomes an issue along with the associated pollution.
I stand by it. Electric cars (battery powered) are not the future, just a temporary distraction on the way.
Simply wrong.
Battery capacity has improved slowly but steadily every year for the past two decades, and will continue to do so for the next couple of decades, even without any fundamental technology developments.
And there is nothing in the “laws of physics” which dictates any particular limit on energy density – and certainly nothing which would prevent it exceeding that of gasoline.
Ok Nigel, good luck with that then. Looking forward to the day you can squeeze more electricity energy into the same space/weight ratio as gasoline, and refill it in the same time too. Hopefully my snowmobile will run on it and I can ride it through hell 🙂
Energy companies have bought up and shut down anything interesting over the last 100 years. I know people working on projects who have been intimidated family threatened and generally harassed.
Lack of progression is not technical.
My wife and I had looked forward to it as an important and needed development in motorsport. We both hated it. She said it was like watching scalextric, but not as exciting. It was too quiet, but when you could hear the cars, it was irritating. It looked slow, and was. The commentary and presentation teams on ITV4 were really amateurish. Didn’t really notice the music, was it supposed to be a feature? And as for Prost’s driving….. As my wife said, they won’t give him much of a penalty, as there’s too much at stake for the series. We’ve cancelled the series record setting, and won’t be watching again.
I agree with almost everything – there were some huge accomplishments, there were some great moments, there is potential everywhere.
The cars did seem slow at times, except when changing direction etc, but the biggest thing that I wish goes, and this rates higher on my dislike list than fanboost, is the music.
I love music, but not all types, I hate that type of music they used, and I am sat watching motorsport.
Much like I love music, I love food, but I don’t love all types of food, for I hate asparagus. If I decide I want to sit down and eat a pizza, I don’t want it to have asparagus for additional flavour content.
Some things don’t universally mix and if I chose to order a pizza or watch motorsport, I can add my own rock music if I want it, or my own bbq sauce if I want it.
The only problem I have with this is how you keep saying the technology isn’t ready. It’s a first-year spec series where they tried to keep costs down and I’m convinced they didn’t use the top-of-the-line technology anyway. The cars have 300kg of batteries and only 30kWh of storage, whereas my car (Tesla Roadster), which is 6 years old, has ~450kg of batteries and 59kWh of energy storage – a 31% increase in energy density over the FE cells. The current most energy-dense car (Tesla Model S) has 85kWh of storage in ~450kg of batteries, which is an 88% increase in density over the FE cars. With nearly double the energy in the same weight, we could see cars either twice as powerful (300/400kW instead of 150/200kW), twice as long of a race (2hr instead of 1hr), or the same race distance without car swapping. And this is consumer-available tech which exists right now, which is in fact using cells a couple years old by now. So I think the technology is here, they’re just not using it. When the series becomes constructed, you can expect a huge leap forward, and then continued rapid progression – as has happened in electric motorcycle racing, which you can see graphs of here http://green.autoblog.com/2014/06/05/john-mcguinness-destroys-tt-zero-record-at-117-miles-per-hou/
Whoops, I was wrong, the batteries do not weigh 300kg, they weigh 200kg. Someone told me 300kg and I believed them, I shouldn’t have done that. So it looks like they have pretty good energy density after all. The link about progression of battery tech is still correct, though. Once the series gets constructed I’m sure it will advance very quickly.
I really enjoyed.
It was, dare I say, way more exciting than a lot of F1 races we’ve seen in the past. And with the identical performance of the machines, I think this could become the purest form of motorsport after Karting.
The car swapping thing is the only blot on what would have otherwise been an amazing spectacle – it sends out the wrong message for the technology, and plays into the hands of the nay-sayers who insist on putting down battery powered vehicles at any given opportunity.
If anyone from the organising committee is reading this comment – change the format from one 25 lap race to two super sprints until the engineers are able to increase the energy densities. And go for a reversed grid on race 2… 🙂
I’ll be driving my Leaf to work feeling even more smug now.
Nicely put.
Later in the day I was watching the Goodwood Revival, with 15-20 cars of the same model, racing flat out. The racing was fabulous. Driver skill & car preparation created an edge – and there was plenty of spectacle.
& yes, while the Formula E technology isn’t quite mature enough yet, that’ll come over the next year or two.
It’s really the circuit that got in the way of the racing. Goodwood lets races flow, and gives drivers more opportunities to overtake than just outbraking into the chicane.
So maybe what E needs *right now* is circuits with more than just 90 degree bends & chicanes.
There’s greater advancement in war than peace – I think the problem of “not ready yet” is something that doesn’t get solved until somebody just does it anyway. If one year of no development with a relatively stable car can persuade us this is viable racing then next year, when things open up, we can see the arms race push things faster than years of sitting on our arses thinking about it could have.
Exactly the point I wanted to make; but so much better expressed!
I wasn’t exactly overwhelmed, but I have some questions…
How much would it cost to start a Formula E team?
What if a company develops a “breakthrough” battery technology that delivers say, twice the power at half the weight? Would that new technology even be allowed in Formula E? Would this company be forced to license this new technology to all the teams?
From next year they will be opening the tech so you can use your own components. So yeah that battery would be allowed however this early on I don’t know how much the rules have been nailed down.
However the example you mention is what this series is hoping to promote based on their goals.
Great article Will as ever. I was very cynical about how well this championship would work and after watching yesterday’s race I was so happy to be proven wrong.
In my mind, it would have been a success for the race yesterday to rival even some of the more mediocre F1 races and it really did deliver. The part I’m going to be fascinated with is how it progresses – not only in the racing but the tech it will deliver. After the response it got from most people yesterday I would be surprised if there wasn’t a whole load more sponsors clambering over themselves to be apart of this.
Finally, fair play to ITV4 – no adverts during the race! I was so surprised at this and I’m glad to see it. The presenting was a bit cringey at times but if that’s one of my biggest complaints it’s a win in my books. (Felt for Jann, he looked so nervous! But well done to him.)
Jennie Gow apologised for the music after the race. 😉
Great Arti again Willard. I Totes loved pretty much everything about e… from being at the tests at Donny, to watching it on ITV4. trying new things should always be applauded. I was very disappointed to see so much negativity and snobbery from other journo’s, some well respected ones before the race had even begun.
Race was better than I had imagined it to be…. Bring on Race 2 !
I think you are spot-on here Will – that was a really promising start to a new championship and showed some amazing potential for the future: some great racing and overtaking (Prost’s move was awful BUT it did make for a dramatic end!), some interesting strategies and the cars looked and sounded good!
I sat and watched with my wife who has never been a motorsport fan but she was intrigued by this (kudos to the organisers for getting her interested!). For us the only real downsides were the TV graphics – using light coloured fonts on light coloured backgrounds (and it not being broadcast in HD on ITV4 in the UK) meant it was infuriating trying to read and decipher some of what was appearing on screen. There was also far too little of what positions drivers where in – it needs the near-constant ticker across the bottom like in F1 coverage. Another downside was the FanBoost – I’ll ignore whether it is a good or bad thing, the point is that it IS here – after all the coverage of trying to get people to vote for their favourite driver (which my wife did) we were then never shown/told if or when it was used!!
The final negative has to be Formula E’s own website/news – their site was nearly impossible to access after the race (not enough server bandwidth I suspect). Four hours after the end of the race the leading headline on the site was still that Prost had got pole position!! I appreciate that as a new championship it wouldn’t get the same number and breadth of news coverage as F1 etc, but it was really difficult to find out post-race if/why Abt had got the penalty )along with others).
Overall, I think there is LOADS of potential and I’m looking forward to it developing over the next few years. I also hope that the organisers of Formula E realise that if you are trying to target the millennial generation (with FanBoost, constant music etc etc) then you need a LOT more info on screen! Everyone of that age will be watching the screen with one eye and have their phone tablet in their hand at the same time – give us as much info as possible about what is going on! Give us constant driver positions! Whenever its in-car footage show the car telemetry data graphics! When someone activates FanBoost INSTANTLY cut to them OR show a graphic on screen that says “(driver X) is using FanBoost”.
Really looking forward to seeing the next few races!
Looking forward to the next round!
Hello Will,
I really like all your comments,it’s always positive and highly critical in the good way.
I was in Beijing,on site and here are my feelings.
Organisation.
Alejandro Aggag dreamed about this huge project 2 years ago and his difficult dream came true.That in itself is remarkable!
Technic,rules,cars,drivers,batteries,paddock,teams,exclusive “emotion” lounge,TV coverage,track fencing and concrete blocks for the track,hotels,transfers for people all around the world,etc,all started from scratch!…
It is a tremendous job!…Nothing is perfect but at least,he tried,with 95% of success…There always people to criticize but we were 3000 people working on the event,including 1800 security agents!…
A lot of personnel working on the event are F1,WEC,WTCC people so the level was very professional and the FIA looks happy with the job done.We can always improve better.
Circuit.
The track was inspected and certified by FIA so it was completely legal but still very exciting for many portions of the track.I guess the track must have a lot of chicanes,very technical,to allow the best critical overtaking,and not so long straight to force drivers to try to overtake if they want to gain a position.The “sausage kerbs” are necessary,if not all the drivers will cut the chicanes and a lot of complain will be presented,with right justification,to FIA stewards.
Sound.
The cars sounds like a strong whistling sound,a little bit like Audi Le Mans style.The gearbox was “clonging”,the tyres were screeching,the cars are “alive”.The major problem is to find a real good way to reinstate the real sound on site to your TV.All the sounds guys were working on it and they really probably increase the “racing sound” level high up for the next races,by putting more microphones around the track.About the music,It was new,quiet unusual but no problem for me.
TV cameras.
They were a lot of cameras around the track and all the cameramen are very experienced in motor acing TV.We all tried to increase the best camera angle as possible,but by definition,filming a track circuit race is a completely different from a normal permanent circuit.There is 2 positions a cameraman can film on track circuit.Above the fence,4 meters high at least,then you film the cars from above and you squashed the car and kill the speed,but the cameraman is in a safe FIA position.Cameras on the ground,are more exciting,more dangerous and small windows are allowed ,on fences,by FIA to film the cars but the length of the shot is very short but powerful.FIA is very demanding about safety,it is justified and “TV windows” are really rare and must be agreed by FIA safety rules.We tried to film the race the best we could and next time,it will be better,considering,the whole TV team learned a lot to improve the TV signal,under the FIA safety rules.Onboard cameras on cars were different to F1 and we’ll try to show different angles.
Batteries.
I am sure the technology will find a quick solution to lighten the batteries and make them longer use and why not,next year,having 40 cars with 40 drivers,on the track for 35 laps without stopping!…It is probably a dream but they is a lot of people achieving their dream just to engage them!.
Technology.
The technology is at his beginning and it will quickly be improve by motoracing brains,why not,Mr Adrian Newey himself,with the back up of Red Bull tech resources?…
Drivers.
All drivers are really confirmed and professionnel.They all want to race for winning and the tension is at his maximum when they driving but as soon as the cars are in the garage,they are completely relax,affordable,and keen to talk,to sign autographs with a large smile,and it’s a great concept to allow people,like in the US series,to be close to the drivers and the cars.
All the atmosphere onsite,reminds me the A1 GP ambiance with “no stress”,easy access to the paddock,all the personnel from all teams having lunch or dinner together and that’s great,it looks like a family!
Even on the GP2 series,the atmosphere is more “electric” in terms of protecting the set-ups of the cars and none fans can walk on the GP2 paddock.
Overall,the Beijing event was pretty good,quiet young and it will improve seriously race by race and we all hope that the races will be exciting till the end,like this one!
Thanks to al the fans,and come to see a real race and you’ll make your idea by yourself,this is the concept to race in the heart of the cities to promote the “green technology” and to be close to the fans.
Thank you my friend. Great to hear from you and your thoughts given your huge experience not just in F1 but in filming global sport for so many years at the very top level.
See you in Singapore mate.
This also is a great comment full of insight. Great to read.
I have to be bratty and make a joke though…
Well, that’s what happens when you fail out of F1 – either the dole or a FormulaE seat! lol.
[“affable”, I assume…]
😉
Great article and I had the same reservations but also enjoyed it.
Great write-up, Will. I chanced into watching the race in real time (sleep? who needs sleep?) and find that your analysis does well to articulate my concerns/observations … especially w/r/t the perceived – intolerable – delay in the appearance of “competent” help on the scene of Heidfeld’s crash (I don’t even recall seeing the medical car and wasn’t sure if there was even a medical center at the track…but hey, it was late).
You positivism and enthusiasm is appreciated. I hope FormulaE succeeds!
Thanks for your comments and sorry for some “words” not very precise…I am French and I try to translate my French words in English language….Sometimes,it works,sometimes not…Sorry for that!….The important is to share positive comments and improve the sport in all matters,On site and on TV….Cheers!
No worries, I won’t hold that against you! just like I’m sure you won’t hold it against me that one of my passports is American-issue! lol 😉 … No need for you to apologize about your use of English – I knew exactly what you meant but I couldn’t resist making a joke with respect to “affordable” being used to describe Formula_E drivers, given how much talk there is of pay drivers in F1 now, and the criticisms (unjust, imo) that FormulaE was not serious or “real” racing.
So again, please don’t think I was criticizing you and your English is quite adequate to communicate with (and there’s always Google Translate when in doubt). In fact, I should probably apologize to you if my comment seemed anything other than light-hearted fun.
Your posting was actually incredibly informative and helpful for me to understand what the challenges were that you faced and why things may have looked as they did on-screen for us viewers. You also said something very fair and insightful that I wish others would acknowledge:
I was a professional cyclist for many years and had the privilege to compete in what was then an entirely new pro cycling league, based in America but consisting of a league of franchised, city-affiliated teams (just like in football or American football, how teams are owned and operated by businesspeople for profit) – it was called the “National Cycle League” (someday I’ll write about it. My first year was in 1994, and our ” world title race” was held in Monaco! It was amazing what the founder Peter O’Neil achieved in organizing the venture and making his dream happen, especially when he faced determined opposition from traditional cycling federations that actually tried direct sabotage of the venture! I saw what a challenge it was to build something new and imagine it must be an order of magnitude greater w/ a more complex event series like motor racing FormulaE.
I don’t know if the series will be commercially or sporting successful…I watched round 1 out of sense of sense of loyalty to motorsport and appreciation for the efforts of all those involved in making F.E. happen, and sense of fairness and desire for the event’s success, but it was not anywhere near as compelling to me as Formula 1 – meaning given a forced choice, I would choose F1. But I know that’s not the point of FormulaE (to take audience from F1), and Aggag wants to build a new audience. I expect that the series will become more entertaining spectacle and compelling for fans as issues like those raised here by our friend Will are resolved.
Cheers!
PS. Note to Will: I’m becoming even more of a fan, man! Saw a great tweet from you about how FIA could’ve avoided the inevitable chaos of insane radio ban by simply telling FOM not to broadcast the messages, or to censor them even more heavily to suppress the annoying “how should i drive?”-type messages, while working covertly with the teams to reduce just that phenomena IF it’s really hurting the sporting integrity and the entertainment spectacle (not convinced that it is…but i understand why it’s kinda off-putting to hear drivers being told how to drive by engineers so they sound like passive operators). The banning of communication for bite points and start settings is just one example of how extreme and knee-jerkish this is.
The lunatics really are running the asylum, it seems. Bernie is now such an impediment to progress, and CVC’s ownership is an equally malignant and predatory force that I fear we fans will have to become even more unified and militant in our boycotting of GP-ticket sales and paid F1 tv if we’re to even get noticed by the financiers and self-important pseudo big-wigs who don’t care or don’t understand how they could be doing a better job, and making F1 more sustainable, fairer, economically viable, fun and interesting.
Come on Will, a real anti-gravity pilot would know it’s spelled with a capital E just like Formula E, lol.
Awesome to see a screencap of WipEoutHD in your article, along with Psygnosis’ F1 games WipEout series releases were the driving factor behind me moving from a PSOne to a PS2 and then a PS3. Great series, still love the original and bust it out now and again although the graphics don’t hold up all that well on a 60″VT60 Panasonic plasma.
I wish I knew it was this past week-end, I would have tuned in, I’ll have to set a reminder for the next race. Great to see so many names that F1 fans will recognize amongst the drivers, makes me more inclined to tune in. Cheers.
Great overview Will, I share your opinion on Formula E and I have some high hopes that the car switch will disappear within 2 or 3 seasons, apparently Audi are working on their own power-train for next year or 2016, that would be a massive thing if it is correct. If they could find a way to just slide dead energy cells out the back or side if the car and a new one simply slots in and the cover panels replaced then off they go, then it will bring the pit-stop into play as the sole reason for a set stop time is for safety so the doing up of the belts isn’t compromised, if they get to just swapping an energy cell, it would really be a boost forthe series. I do hope when it’s had 5 years to mature you will look back at this article and see which areas they have successfully addressed and where they are still lacking, plus any new things they have bought in.
As always I’ve really enjoyed reading your work Will, I share many of your opinions with regard motorsport in general and you give a great objective on topics.
I like it when I read comments like yours from other visitors to the site – then I feel like it’s less weird that I agree with pretty much all of Will’s been saying since I’ve been paying attention (even if I was really rude to him when I first decided to comment on something).
Will, the ABP-icon in my browser shows that we’re not blocking any ads here, but I’d actually turn it off if you started to try to monetize traffic to this site, as the quality of content is fantastic. Keep up the good work!
One last thing – can you point me to a thorough and correct explanation of what really went down w/ Max Chilton, his dad, their banker(s) and backers, Marussia, the American stand-in driver, etc? I thought Rencken would’ve written that up but didn’t really find anything.
(at Spa (re. Chilton/Marussia seat) obviously)
Overall, for an initial race, I enjoyed it. Agree that they need to turn up the sounds of the cars. I HATED the background “music”. I found that intensely annoying.
Agree with your comments except I was not a fan of the music.
I know they need an extended paddock area, but the pit lane was excessively long. Looks the same for the UK Battersea race (if that happens), but on the flip side, how on earth do they expect to cater for 40 cars in Monaco’s already tight pit lane???
I’ve been saying for years that electric car racing would sound more interesting — not less as so many assume. This is because, with the quieter motors, we can hear more of the squeals of the tyres. We even got a bit of that in F1 broadcasts this year. I’d love to hear an electric dirt late-model whipping around a quarter-mile bullring!
Electric cars could save America’s short tracks, which are shutting down at an alarming rate because of people moving into new housing near them who then complain about the noise.
Once the rules of Formula E are opened up, we’ll surely have a disparity between the teams, but likely we’ll also see rapid advances in technology in a similar fashion to what we used to see in Formula 1 or IndyCar decades ago before things became so tightly regulated to keep the speeds and costs down. It depends on how much money the FIA will let FE teams spend.