How a Formula E weekend works
The all-electric series set out to stand apart, forging its own identity while maintaining motorsport’s fundamental appeal. Here’s our guide to the essentials of an E-prix
Since its inception, Formula E has been keen to underline its credentials as a disruptive force in motorsport. Completely unbeholden to history and tradition, the championship’s management has often favoured previously unexplored formats and methods of going racing to make Formula E stand out. In other words, to the uninitiated, Formula E has a lot of key differences over ‘traditional’ racing categories that require some degree of explanation.
The key parts of a race weekend remain the same: drivers try to qualify for the best grid slot, and then fight for victory in the race, but the tools to get them there are a little different. Let’s run through how a race weekend works.
PRACTICE SESSIONS
On a single-race weekend, there are traditionally two half-hour free practice sessions preceding qualifying and the race, with a third session on the following day if the weekend has a second race. In practice, teams can explore set-up options in their preparations for the following sessions, and the times logged by the end of the session have no bearing on the rest of the weekend.
QUALIFYING
Formula E introduced an all-new qualifying format for the 2021-22 season, following criticism levelled at its old superpole format, where track evolution often favoured the final group and created an artificially jumbled grid. Now, drivers are split into two groups based on championship position, with the odd-positioned drivers placed into Group A and the even-positioned drivers put into Group B.
Each group has a 12-minute session allocated to it, allowing drivers the latitude to set multiple laps across the session. Once each session is complete, the top four drivers from each group progress into the duels. Group A’s fastest driver faces off against Group B’s fourth-fastest
driver, the second-fastest driver from Group A battles against third place from Group B, and so on. The two drivers are offset slightly on track, attempting to set the fastest time in each duel.
The fastest driver in each of the quarter-final duels progresses to the semi-finals, where they do battle once more in a bid to get to the final. Once there, the drivers duke it out for pole position; the fastest time in the final yields pole, with the losing finalist being rewarded with second on the grid. Third and fourth on the grid are ordered by the losing semi-finalists’ times, with fifth to eighth in the order of times set by the losing quarter-finalists.
After this, the rest of the grid is staggered by the drivers’ positions in the groups. If the polesitter is from Group A, ninth place on the grid is occupied by the fifth-fastest driver from that group, with 10th occupied by their Group B counterpart – or vice versa, if the polesitter began in the second qualifying group.
RACE FORMAT
Formula E runs to a timed race format, with each race set at 45 minutes plus one lap. This means that the drivers must go as fast as possible while conserving enough energy within the battery, which has a capacity of 54kwh, to get to the end of the race. As the battery does not begin with enough charge to last the race, drivers must regenerate energy at the rear of the car, employing tactics such as lifting and coasting to ensure that the motor puts energy back into the battery and slows the car down at the same time.
To add a tactical element into the race, Formula E has an attack mode function, in which drivers have the option to take to a loop off the racing line to enter a higher power mode, moving up from the standard
220kw power level allowed in the race to 250kw.
The quantity of attack mode activations mandated within each race is open to variation, the most common involving two activations lasting four minutes each, but at double-header races this can change. For example, the second Rome E-prix last month enforced just one activation lasting eight minutes. Drivers must use the whole activation before the end of the race.
Formula E also introduced the concept of Fanboost, where fans vote for a driver to receive a one-time, five-second burst of 250kw power mode. The top five drivers voted for by the fans receive Fanboost in time for the second half of the race. Although it has rarely had an influence on the outcome of a race, Fanboost has nonetheless remained controversial.
To cover the reduced energy used under a safety car, Formula E has also introduced added time to races, where every minute of the race run under safety car conditions will result in 45s being added on to the end.
From there, it’s like any other racing category: be the first one to cross the line to win. And that’s the most difficult part… ■