How Valencia E-Prix farce left Formula E with an image problem

Countdown dictionary corner resident Susie Dent has an entertaining habit of capturing the mood of the moment when she tweets her ‘Word of the Day’. Amid news of the short-lived plans for the breakaway European Super League, her pick was “ingordigiousness: extreme greed; an insatiable desire for wealth at any cost”. Lexicographer Dent didn’t make reference to the final lap of the Valencia E-Prix on Saturday, but she didn’t have to. For the word many were tying to the inaugural Formula E race in Spain could be derived from “farce”. It wasn’t a good look for the series in its first season under FIA World Championship status.

Holes have been exposed in the FIA regulations every time the electric paddock has met in 2021. The campaign kicked off in Saudi Arabia with a clutch of blameless drivers having their qualifying lap times deleted by a yellow flag incident up the road, only to start the race from grid slots behind the guilty party. In Rome, there were lobbying efforts to move the position of the staggered start line away from the exit of a blind bend after Oliver Turvey rounded said unsighted corner and clattered into stationary cars awaiting a practice launch. Events at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo will take some beating. Just nine of the 24 drivers were classified after the final of five safety car periods led to one last slash in energy usage limits.

Of those nine, three made it to the finish reportedly using the “pit-limiter” to lap at a little above walking speed. Among those was Jean-Eric Vergne, who reckoned he had undertaken a six-minute effort. A further three drivers stopped on track, while five more were disqualified altogether for exceeding permitted energy levels. Adding confusion, the cars weren’t out of battery. They had the charge going spare to easily reach the flag but what they had done is use up every last drop of energy that the FIA had legally permitted them to run.

This came at an event that likely had more eyes on it than normal. There was a sense of intrigue garnered by Formula E racing on a permanent track for the first time in its now 74-race history. But the scenes viewers were treated to turned the series into “the joke of the week” in the eyes of its defending champion Antonio Felix da Costa.

What was required in the moments after the controversial climax was deft communication. Instead, Formula E issued this baffling official statement to media: "Energy management is key in Formula E. The race today shows the skill and strategy needed to combine speed and energy management."

In essence, it was blaming those drivers and teams who didn’t make the finish and opening the flood gates for range anxiety-based battery criticism. But that was only half of the original draft, with the intriguing part two retracted. Matters weren’t eased by the FIA, whose defence was fronted by Formula E director Frederic Bertrand. In his thankless task of facing the media, he made more than a passing reference to erstwhile race leader da Costa. He reckoned the DS Techeetah driver could have slowed the pack more at the final safety car restart, let the 45-minute timer tick down from 15 seconds to zero, to create a one-lap sprint, rather than the eventual two.

Antonio Felix Da Costa, DS Techeetah, DS E-Tense FE21

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Bertrand said: “For sure, it was surprising that this choice was done this way [by Da Costa] to have that extra lap. I would say in the feeling being done, for sure it was clearly making life difficult to a lot of drivers and the leader in particular. When you look at all the circumstances and the way this happened, it's a very tricky race. At the end there is in a few seconds something which happens, which maybe is not the right decision at the end.”

Da Costa was having none of it, and nor were his defendants who felt the Portuguese had been thrown under the bus in these comments. His very public reply was: “I’m sorry, but I can’t accept this. If I go even slower under [the safety car], how many teams would have protested me at the end? And also, if I go slower, they would have reduced more energy. Today it was only on the hands of the FIA to save all of us from this.”

The pace of the restart was largely da Costa’s prerogative. Instead, the sequences of events can be attributed to an FIA amendment that means for each minute spent under full-course yellow or safety car conditions, 1kWh of the 52kWh race total can be deducted from the energy each driver can legally use.

This comes under the discretion of the FIA and its team led by race director Scot Elkins. It’s not hard and fast meaning that rather than the final 5kWh slash, which took the sum subtraction to 19kWh, the number could have been lower or even nothing at all.

"If I go even slower under [the safety car], how many teams would have protested me at the end? And also, if I go slower, they would have reduced more energy. Today it was only on the hands of the FIA to save all of us from this"Antonio Felix da Costa

This is particularly pertinent at a permanent circuit where energy was always going to be marginal. The reason a much-maligned temporary chicane made its way on the Valencia layout was to offer an additional heavy braking zone to allow drivers to stamp on the brakes and harvest more energy at a faster track. In the remaining two laps, however, there wasn’t sufficient opportunity to regain the energy taken away by the in-race amendments in what was reported to Autosport as an “impossible final target”.

But what of race winner Nyck de Vries, runner-up Nico Muller and Stoffel Vandoorne? The latter recovered from having his qualifying lap deleted for an incorrect tyre barcode to start plumb last and score an unlikely podium. As Bertrand said: “as we have seen today, there are some who have been able to have success”.

He is right. They made it to the finish at something close to race speed with their energy levels intact. However, as with his commanding victory in the opening race of the season in Saudi, again de Vries was under-consuming for much of the race and had energy to burn over his rivals. Muller, who started 22nd, was lumped with a drivethrough penalty early on for overpower usage. Vandoorne was entering a race where he and the Mercedes team expected very little reward. He was also hit with a 5s time penalty for forcing, incidentally, Dragon Penske Autosport racer Muller off track.

Race winner Nyck de Vries, Mercedes-Benz EQ, EQ Silver Arrow 02, Stoffel Vandoorne, Mercedes-Benz EQ, EQ Silver Arrow 02 celebrate in Parc Ferme

Photo by: Alastair Staley / Motorsport Images

With these reprimands, as one person put it to Autosport, their race strategy then turned into “betting it all on black”. They were forced into salvage missions and arguably it was more luck than judgement that meant events turned out in their favour and they scored unlikely changes in fortune. They were the exceptions rather than indicators that everyone could have feasibly made it to the end of this dramatic encounter.

Energy reductions under the safety car has been an ongoing topic. Last time out in Rome, Jaguar Racing driver and pre-Valencia points leader Sam Bird was wiped out on the final lap when he was tagged by de Vries - who carried a five-place grid drop to Spain as a result. He reckoned he had been in that position in the first place, on the fringes of the top 10, due to miscommunication over his remaining energy due to earlier incidents in the race.

The issue was then brought up in the Friday meeting of team mangers, as confirmed to the media by Bertrand. He said "Yep, I have confirmation from Scot. The question was raised on will it be the same call than for Rome to put the safety car [out] and then to withdraw the energy in case it comes in the last part of the race.

“I think it was consistent with what he announced the day before. So, I think there's no specific fault to have on that case. He was asked, he answered, and he applied.”

There will be lessons learned from these recent events. Although lost among the plethora of talking points from only the opening day in Valencia, at the end of the opening free practice session the FIA introduced a yellow flag on the approach to Turn 12 to alert drivers of the practice start procedure they would meet on the home straight. That looked to directly combat the cause of the Turvey shunt in Rome. But Bertrand says there will be no change for the second race of the Spanish double-header by way of a reaction.

For TV viewers, for all teams and drivers involved and for the manufacturer boardrooms watching on, these events were not a good look for Formula E. Things weren’t helped by patchy party lines of communication and putting a champion in the crosshairs. It has created another image problem for Formula E both among apologist fans and in the motorsport mainstream.

Nico Muller, Dragon Penske Autosport, Penske EV-5, Edoardo Mortara, Venturi Racing, Silver Arrow 02

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

Bertrand reckoned his competitors slowing to a crawl and being disqualified on the final lap was “part of the show”. He said: “People understand all the challenges this championship has. It's not only driving; it's not only managing your race as normal but it's also managing all these aspects of energy management. Let's keep it as a challenge for the championship.

“Let's keep these types of aspects of the championship high so that people understand how difficult it is to win here for a team, for a driver. To be consistent on the season is also very difficult. We prefer to have a high fight level up to the last minute and the last metres. But still, that's part of the Formula E challenge, managing energy. We can't avoid that.”

For TV viewers, for all teams and drivers involved and for the manufacturer boardrooms watching on, these events were not a good look for Formula E

Yet that tallies alongside his comments that “This is clearly not the way we like it. We don't think it's the type of end of race we would like to have every weekend. Once was clearly enough, and I hope everybody learned and it will never happen again.”

This controversial end to the wet race, which had the early hallmarks of a thriller, was not the result of a perfect storm. That implies too much was down to bad luck, coincidence and was ultimately out of peoples’ hands. But events in Valencia that created an image problem for Formula E were avoidable in the first instance and not relayed better to the audience and to media in the second as a difficult start to a season lingers on.

When FIA president Jean Todt attended the Rome E-Prix earlier this month and said the media and the governing body needed to work together to give more coverage to Formula E, the last 24 hours probably weren't what he had in mind.

The Safety Car and Antonio Felix Da Costa, DS Techeetah, DS E-Tense FE21

Photo by: Andrew Ferraro / Motorsport Images