The highs and lows of the first-ever Indian Formula E race at Hyderabad

The year 2023 saw Formula E arrive in India for the very first time. Hopes were high among Indian fans as they flocked to the Hyderabad Street Circuit to see the race in person. Even more eyes were glued to mobile and TV screens, watching with enthusiasm as the lights went out. It was looking like a good weekend for Jaguar TCS Racing Team as one of their drivers, Mitch Evans started from pole and was hanging onto the lead during the opening laps. However, an unfortunate turn of events led to him being taken out by his own teammate Sam Bird. But that was just a taste of how unpredictable motorsports can be and there were more twists and turns ahead.A number of drivers suffered crashes and collisions while others moved up and down the order. The margins were tight and the cars close to each other. Jean-Eric Vergne of DS Penske waited patiently for the right moment and then sprang into first place. He was quick to adapt to the new track but the battle was not over yet. As he reached the last two laps, the battery level in his car was sitting at 1%. On top of this, he had two Envision Racing cars on his tail and up ahead was a chance to get his first Formula E win since Season 7. An average person would be sweating through their palms in such a situation and with the stakes being so high.“I was actually very calm”, is what Jean-Eric Vergne had to say about his state of mind during those final few laps of the race. This short answer tells you everything you need to know about the level at which these athletes operate. The French driver managed to get this win despite having some trouble with the braking on his car. He explained, “I was not able to have very good braking because it was very inconsistent. When I was behind Mitch in the beginning, I almost hit him a couple of times because I lost the brakes in some parts of the braking zone.”The struggle with the brakes meant that Vergne had to be extra cautious while going around the track and also manage his regen system. “Because of the issue I was having, I was not recuperating enough energy. So, I had to find some ways to lift earlier in some places. Try and save more energy in some places while keeping the others behind.”, said Vergne.Talking about the slim margins in terms of battery charge, the Frenchman said, “The way you see things on TV, the 1%, 4% (of charge), that's not something I see in the car. What I see is the energy remaining and I knew that when I was going on the last lap, I had the same amount of energy as the lap before. Basically, I knew where I had to lift to make it through the finishing line. And when I crossed the finishing line, one meter later I had no power. That's something we train for in the simulator, to finish with no energy because we are in the view that if you finish the race with three extra per cent of energy, this is a three per cent that was not used in the race.” The Hyderabad e-Prix drew in more than 25,000 people and showed the world of Formula E that there are plenty of fans of the sport in India. The race itself was hailed as one of the best in recent times and the extremely close gap between cars towards the final few laps only added to the excitement of the viewersWhen asked about his impressions of the track, Vergne answered, “The track itself was quite nice. Once it got cleaned away by the cars, the track was actually fun to drive. I liked the layout with all kinds of high-speed and medium-speed corners. The only issue really was the first chicane made it impossible for the FIA to really monitor well the track limit situation.”The chicane at Turn 1 and 2 was so tight that most cars ended up crossing track limits in order to maintain pace. Vergne along with some other drivers expressed concerns about maintaining track limits. Before the start of the Free Practice sessions, Sam Bird of Jaguar TCS Racing Team had also spoken about the chicane, “What Formula E has created at Turn 1 & 2 is a very, very fast chicane and I feel that it will be a difficult area to police track limits. It is also an area where the cars could be damaged”. This concern turned out to be true as many drivers got warnings for crossing track limits at the chicane during the qualifying and race sessions. Vergen said, “And since everybody was doing it, it was hard not to do it. So I've had my three warnings like everyone else and then I made sure not to ever go above the limit. But yeah, that one corner was bad but nothing that they cannot fix.”But the tricky chicane was not the only concern that was raised by Vergne, “Honestly I expected better from the infrastructure. I think that was not at a level where Formula E should operate. So I do hope that if we come back we see a clear significant improvement.” When asked about what he thought needed to be improved with regards to arrangements in India, Vergne said, “The whole infrastructure of the paddock, probably traffic management, a bit more communication from all aspects from the police to the organiser and just to get the track ready on time because when we arrived as teams, nothing was ready. Yeah, it was ready for the (race) day but when you think about it they knew long enough that we were coming and I just don't understand why it was ready so late. I mean there were not even toilets in the paddock. So, you know, all this kind of thing is so easy to implement if you work on time and I feel that it was done very last minute.”It is not just the drivers that felt that the event lacked in terms of management. A lot of fans who paid good money to watch the race were also complaining about the arrangements and how things were handled. Alberto Longo, co-founder of Formula E believes that the niggles are not unusual for the large part but did admit that a lot of the arrangements were finalised at the 11th hour. “We have a whole year to keep on working together but we cannot forget that (things were not as smooth) obviously and it is true that we basically finalised things very last minute. That was something that we raised to our partner, locally. But I am absolutely positive that in years to come, these will be a much smoother operation. The fact that we have a local partner who is very engaged and very passionate about doing the races there, I'm positive that it will be better and better every year as we have done in many other locations.”While there is no doubt that the race could have been managed in a better manner, one must also realise that hosting a world-class event like Formula E in India for the first time is no small feat. We do hope that the organisers learn from this experience and come back next year with more preparation so that all parties involved can enjoy the sport. “We all need to understand that the racetrack only 14 days ago was a completely different thing and then we transformed the heart of the beautiful city of Hyderabad into a permanent track. So, those are a lot of challenges and obviously, we try to minimise the disruption to the neighbourhoods and the people who are around and that does sometimes create some challenges. But again, nothing different than what we have had in cities like Hong Kong, Paris, Mexico, Rome, London, etc.”, said Longo.Historically, Vergne has performed well on new tracks. He seems to adapt to brand-new environments much faster than some other drivers on the grid. When asked if new tracks were his speciality, Jean said, “I like new tracks because you have to work fast, understand things fast and I quite like that. Winning on a new track doesn't mean that you're going to win on another new track. All the work has to be redone for a different track.” The upcoming races in Cape Town & Sao Paulo are also brand-new additions to the calendar. So, we asked JEV if he was expecting more podium finishes in those races as well. He replied, “I would come with the same mentality as I came in India and just not overthink it. Just get out there try and do the best job possible and try to have fun at the same time.”Despite this encouraging win in Hyderabad, Vergne has not got his head in the clouds. He mentioned that the team still has work to do and the car has to be more competitive to get consistently good results. He said, “My goal at the moment is to improve this car so that we can be in a position to fight for the championship.” The Frenchman also said, “On a scale of 1 to 100, I would say that after the first three races we were probably at 20% with 100% being very hard to get to, especially in Formula E. But I think now we're more like, you know 60%, so we still have a big margin for improvement.”After India, Formula E is heading to Sao Paulo for the first-ever Formula E race there. This season has seen four new tracks being added to the race calendar in order to appeal to a wider audience. Regardless of the issues that the event had in India, I am sure that the teams, drivers and fans would love to revisit the Hyderabad Street Circuit to put up an even better show and perhaps make it a track that is well-known across the globe.