After four years of racing (and upgrading) the same chassis, the FIA Formula E Championship is preparing to enter its fifth season with an all-new car. And the Gen-2 racer brings with it a wide range of improvements over the old one.
It looks better, for starters, with an exterior design more identifiable as belonging to the electric racing series than any of the myriad other formula racing classes competing around the world. Plus, it’ll be able to go the full race distance on a single charge, instead of the drivers having to swap to a fully charged second car halfway through the race.
And all of that is well and fine. But the real question on the minds of fans the world over – to say nothing of the teams and drivers – is how much faster the new car will be. To answer that question, the series organizers put together this little showdown between the old car and the new one.
The challenges took place at Donington – the circuit that Formula E uses for most of its testing, and where the teams themselves are based. It included a drag race, a 0-100 km/h (62 mph) acceleration battle, and a 0-150-0 battle to see which could get up to 93 mph and back to a standstill in the shortest time and distance.
Fortunately, they brought two experienced Formula E racing drivers along to take the wheels of each car, with Lucas di Grassi handling a Gen1 car (like the one in which he won the 2016/17 championship) and newcomer BMW‘s Antonio Felix da Costa in a Gen2 machine. See how the two cars compared in their hands in the two-and-a-half-minute video below.