Why even Porsche cannot be certain of FE success

There is a motorsport giant preparing to re-enter the spotlight. The last time it took to the stage, it swept all before it in one of the highest-profile racing categories, winning arguably the world's most famous race three times in a row, with three double titles (drivers' and constructors') to boot.

This company hasn't achieved great feats in every motorsport sphere it has entered. In Formula 1, it made sporadic works entries during the early years of the world championship, winning one grand prix. Later it enjoyed major triumphs as an engine supplier, but then, after an unsuccessful attempt to crack Indycar racing between 1987 and '90 (leaving with a category record of one win and three poles), its second stint supplying F1 powerplants was a disaster.

Porsche hasn't returned to F1 since its Footwork partnership ended midway through the 1991 season, but its reappearance at Le Mans and the top level of sportscar racing in the World Endurance Championship earlier this decade was nothing short of glorious. After taking these accolades between 2015 and '17, Porsche followed fellow Volkswagen-owned marque Audi out of the WEC in the wake of the '15 emissions scandal and headed for ABB FIA Formula E.

"Formula E is the first time where Porsche enters a championship where they don't build the full car themselves - 70-80% of the car, most probably, is given" Neel Jani

Now, its start to life in the electric championship is just around the corner. In the upcoming 2019/20 campaign, Porsche will join the FE fray for the first time - alongside other famous newcomer Mercedes - and return to single-seater competition for the first time in nearly 30 years.

But even though it is "basically all the same guys, more or less," that ran the crack LMP1 squad, according to its WEC and now FE team manager Amiel Lindesay (pictured below), things will be different for Porsche.

For a start, its team has had to be downsized to suit its new surroundings. While Porsche's LMP1 operational team size was 65, FE limits squads to 20 staff dedicated to working on the car at the track. Plus, as the championship is a spec aerodynamic formula, Porsche's LMP1 aero engineers will be among those now fulfilling what Lindesay calls "multi-project" duties back in Weissach.

Another major difference for Porsche as it prepares to make its FE entrance is that so much of the car it will race for the next three seasons is the same as the competition. In its previous home in the WEC, absolutely everything Porsche could build for itself, it did.

"If we could do the steering wheel differently we would do it," Neel Jani, Porsche's only confirmed FE driver so far, says of its approach to the 919 Hybrid in LMP1. "But [in FE] we cannot, we're not allowed.

"Formula E is the first time where Porsche enters a championship where they don't build the full car themselves - 70-80% of the car, most probably, is given. You cannot build that much by yourself and yeah, it's a Porsche logo on it, but a lot of parts are given.

"Let's take DS or Jaguar or whatever, they have 80% the same car. So naturally it is a lot more difficult to make a difference as a manufacturer when [it doesn't] build parts, but you can make a difference by how the team works, little details and so on. That's where we need to be strong.

"But even in WEC we needed one year - we won the last race [in 2014, pictured below], but then it started very well for us in years two, three, four. So I wouldn't say we can think that Porsche can come and beat everyone straight out of the box because everyone is cooking with water here in the end and we cannot come with something different."

There is a sensible sense of humility coming from Porsche ahead of its FE debut. It is a similar line to HWA's mentality last season, and, even though its feeder team has been doing the ground work this season, Mercedes will likely take a similar approach. These squads are just too smart to overpromise and under-deliver.

Plus, they've seen just how random the spread of success has become in FE - with seven different teams wining the first nine races in 2018/19 - and know that just because they have fearsome reputations in other categories, FE success is not a given.

But winning, naturally, remains the target. And to do that, Porsche must optimise the areas it can work on within FE's tightly regulated powertrain development areas.

After receiving its development car - fitted with many more sensors than the race versions - from FE chassis supplier Spark Racing Technology in January, Porsche shook down that machine at Weissach's testing ground in early March.

The team then decamped to the Calafat circuit, south of Barcelona, for its first proper on-track running. Porsche has therefore begun the 15-day private testing programme each FE manufacturer is permitted ahead of the August powertrain homologation deadline. With the first Calafat running added to the Weissach outing, Porsche had completed six days by the end of April - and remains at the same stage right now.

In the opening Calafat test, during which it claims to have completed more than 1000km, Porsche took the opportunity to train up the team members it will use as back-ups around the main 20-person FE crew.

It also brought its full race garage set-up, which has been designed in-house, takes three hours to assemble, and will fit into all of the structures (a mix of paddock tents and permanent track garages) that FE uses to house its teams throughout a season, to Spain.

Stepping inside the right-hand side of Calafat's two garages was to be transported straight to the likely 2019/20 season opener in Saudi Arabia. That three-hour build time is crucial - once the pre-event curfew lifts, teams can start arranging their temporary garage layouts - and the faster that is done, the faster they can turn their attention to car set-up and final race preparation.

The attention to detail does not stop there - each time Jani and Brendon Hartley (who remains a Porsche factory driver even after his F1 exploits last year) headed out onto the track, the crew gave them the full pitlane exit routine - sending the car into the Calafat car park to join the track via the pitlane gate with utter precision. Everything is to be practiced to perfection.

"Where normally you have at least some references, here we don't know" Neel Jani

In the early stages of its manufacturer testing, which must be completed before the official pre-season test that is slated to take place once again at Valencia in October, Porsche is focused on three main areas.

The first, and "most important" according to Malte Huneke, who was also Porsche's LMP1 performance leader, is to prove the powertrain's reliability. This means maximising track time - Porsche started its Calafat running at 7am each day and did not stop until 12 hours later, although it could not run throughout as the car needs to be charged every hour - and simulating load data. The latter part involves the car hitting kerbs hard to simulate the forces it must survive at FE circuits, as well as accurately measuring the torque being generated, and the current and oscillation of the powertrain.

Next comes a focus on performance improvement - set-up work and understanding the all-weather Michelin tyres, which is critical to FE success. Then checking the powertrain software - which will remain an unrestricted area to work on even when the hardware is homologated - for bugs and potential enhancements.

Although the majority of Porsche's FE team personnel is in place, there are still a few key appointments to come. While Jani was announced as its first race driver back in December 2018, his team-mate is still yet to be revealed.

Hartley is "involved heavily in the development of this project" and "actually felt right at home immediately back with the Porsche shirt on and a lot of familiar faces from my time in LMP1" after his time with Toro Rosso ended after a single F1 season.

He naturally insists questions about the second FE race seat are directed elsewhere at Porsche, and his deal to race with Toyota in the 2019/20 WEC season may well complicate things. But Hartley surely wouldn't be getting valuable seat time that could otherwise go to Jani if he wasn't a contender.

Porsche is also missing a dedicated FE team principal after LMP1 boss Andreas Seidl, who was set to fulfil the role, left to join McLaren in F1. But the squad insists his exit has not hampered its FE preparations.

"It was a shock to lose him, [but] disruption? Not really," says Lindesay. "We were already pretty much up and running by the time the decision was made. [No disruption] for the development or where we were at that point on the project at all. It didn't change anything from one day to the other day. It was business as usual for us."

Back in the WEC, 'business as usual' meant winning. With 17 WEC race wins - including three victories at Le Mans - and six titles (drivers' and teams'), Porsche's LMP1 squad was ultra-successful. Even marginally downsized, it still has an awful lot of knowledge to drawn on as it gears up for its FE entry.

It is making use of the dedicated facilities it built at Weissach for the 919's development, including its high-voltage laboratory. Before the development car arrived, Porsche worked on its FE powertrain in the same facilities as its 'Mission E' electric road car.

But before it can even think of FE domination, something it ultimately achieved in LMP1 even though Toyota won the last three races of Porsche's final season in the class, it must discover if its meticulous preparations will be enough to overcome the championship's many hurdles.

First, there are its experienced rivals, with the majority - in terms of their race operations at least - present since FE's inaugural season. Then there are FE's sporting rules, which are designed to shake-up the competitive order at each round. And then there are the pitfalls of the one-day racing format that follows a limited testing programme.

Even the mighty HWA has struggled more than many expected as it prepares to run Mercedes' works FE operation. And this in particular is why Jani says "It could be - we just don't know yet, we have really no idea", when asked if Porsche will encounter similar issues in its first season.

"The other problem you have in Formula E," he continues," is when we started the Le Mans 919 programme we went testing in Bahrain or at Spa, [and] we had reference lap times because they raced on there [in WEC events]. Well, which racetrack can we go to here and have a reference?

"It's not possible because it's one-day circuits. And these tests are all private - you don't know who drives where in which configuration. So, there is zero reference around and that's another new situation. Where normally you have at least some references, here we don't know.

"We think what we're doing is correct and is good, but we don't know and that is why I'm saying [HWA-like struggles could happen]. It's a completely new situation for Porsche, and for me as well, because of the [spec] car, the championship, how they race, what we do ourselves, and what we're not allowed - it's more that. [What] we're not allowed to do is so much more than what we're allowed, which makes this a very unique challenge."

Porsche's return to the motorsport spotlight has nearly arrived. The glare will intensify over the rest of this calendar year, particularly as Mercedes reveals more details about its own plans, and Jani's team-mate and boss are announced.

But there's one thing with manufacturers in motorsport that Porsche has proved in recent years. They are not guaranteed to stick around. This could be because of certain rule changes - Porsche is already involved in discussions over FE's Gen3 car - board-level developments, or even a lack of success. So, would Porsche stick around in FE even if it can't hit the same level of success it achieved in the WEC, hindered by the category's close-competition and part-spec nature?

"I wouldn't know," says Jani. "But normally yes, because they're also not runners either."