CAN VERGNE OVERTHROW DA COSTA?

It’s a story we’ve told before. DS Techeetah was Jean-eric Vergne’s team. He courted the services of Andre Lotterer and then, when the German left for Porsche, again it was Vergne entrusted to tempt eventual replacement Antonio Felix da Costa.

In that time, Vergne won the drivers’ crown twice in a row – an FE first – and delivered as many teams’ titles to match. But he was thoroughly beaten by da Costa last season. The Portuguese’s three wins and runaway championship success played Vergne’s solitary triumph, which itself came rather late in the day. The French racer is also more abrasive than his team-mate and lost his cool over the radio on more than one occasion.

Vergne seemed to suffer much more with the brakes in qualifying. Given a great deal of his past title success was built on the days he progressed into superpole, then delivering in the races, the fix that DS Techeetah seems to have found tees up an intra-team fight to be relished in 2021.

“I feel very good with the car,” says Vergne. “What [do I need to] do to take the lead again?

Always questioning yourself, working tirelessly, obviously more than I was able to do last year.”

But whereas DS Techeetah had a certain degree of command last year, Vergne isn’t expecting a simple two-way dogfight.

“I wish we were in a Mercedes-style F1 situation where I would only have to worry about my team-mate,” he says. “Unfortunately, there are so many other good drivers and good teams out there that I cannot regard Antonio as my only competitor. I have to watch out for everyone.”