Apart from the, slightly expectable, quality issues regarding the technical side
for the F-E vehicles, the net result of the first ever Formula-E race is highly negative
and in need of immediate attention, as safety levels are far below acceptable point.
Obviously the highlight of the grandprix was the serious incident between the cars of
Nick Heidfeld and Nicolas Prost. Apart from the fact both drivers came out without
injuries - special attention to the severe and extremely violent crash of Heidfeld,
one might get the wrong idea on Formula E being 'safe'.
Though it is true that mechanics and safety rules have done a remarkably well job of
being able to have a driver come unscathed out of such and extreme and violent crash,
there is still a huge amount of safety failures to be taken into account.
there are improvements to be made noticing the fragility of the vehicle suspension
upon contact, and so for the transmission.
What is to be adressed profoundly is the organisation of the race itself, and especially, the quality,
presense and activeness of the marshalls.
criticism is aimed at the visibility of flags controlled by the marshalls. On warm-up, the car
of Karun Chandhok had a malfunction and could not move. There was a tiny movement of the yellow flag,
which should have been waved prominantly. It was hardly visible and it was like the marshalls there just
didn't know or didn't feel like taking an effort.
This creates potentially dangerous situations, and during race there were little yellow flags visible
despite several moments it should have been absolutely visible, especcialy on the race end incident.
Curbstones were dangerously high, which caused the more or less 'minor' incident (race contact) to turn
into a severly dangerous potentially lethal crash by making the car get airborn into the barriers.
these very barriers are positioned way to close or too tight in certain corners, creating a
problem of needing extremely sharp corrections, and a risk of collision pile-up of cars coming to a
halt due to possibile crashes or mistakes.
imho biggest fail on the entire race was at race end, i was in shock of the I3 driver.
The highly risky and absolutely insane driving of the BMW i3 driver immediately after race finish,
drove within the pack of F-E cars - totally unacceptable and most of all totally unneccesary.
Insane if you ask me and potentially dangerous. There was zero need for this and it might even
cause accidents.
The I3 driver should have remained behind the entire pack cruising untill all drivers returned to the
pits/parc ferme.
It's like the cars themselves have been manufactured well enough safety-wise, but apart from that,
it's horrible.
I've enjoyed A1GP of years ago a million times better.
As for the sound, well, yeah don't know what to make of it. Sky commentary was flat and effortless,
missing emotion. The car sound itself really didn't do it any good.
All it was to me was boys playing with lifesize RC cars sitting in the car itself instead of with the remote
control, and it sounded the same, too.
It's like a toy race. It needs to ditch that image hastily.
I don't really see the issue on being a spec series at start, because all start is difficult. Thus it seems more
like 'practice' and 'lab work' rather then actual racing.
It was 'competitive' because all cars were the same, yes. So to me there is little difference to walking into
any given indoor kart racing track and taking a look at that.
So - overall verdict: hugely disappointing, though not expected otherwise due to the 'previews'.
What needs to change:
- wheels. Better bigger tires and either a smaller wheel size or atleast a bit fatter tires.
- wheel 'wells' looks silly and stupid. It's formula class, open-wheeler. I don't care about aero benefit, fix that with power.
it makes the cars look odd while in al fairness, the cars themselves don't look that bad at all.
- replaceable battery pack. how about a bottom 'skidplate' board that houses the batteries and you 'just' lift the car up,
a mechanic uses a device to remove the batterypack, and replace them with fresh ones.
meanwhile tires can be replaced.
- power. seriously underpowered cars. we have several topics here that prove they can be humongeously more powerfull
with virtually no loss. Just look at the LM prototype full-electric car that gets charged without cables.
- fragility. cars are too fragile, point. They are very heavy due to the batteries, but can't take the slightest hit.
It doesn't need to be immortal, but let's look at f.e. how strong Williams suspension is (maldonado-proof). Additionally,
the transmission is below average.
- Needs way more investment. Looks cheap and hobby-ish. Not serious and the future. Could be, but not like this.
- Needs to ditch the spec-concept and become full-homebuilt team effort. Bring in BMW, AUDI/PORSCHE, RENAULT, etc.
to make their very own cars. BMW has some good experience with their i-cars and audi with e-tron. Surely this is a great
testbed and base for development for road cars, like F1 has been before.
- Circuits are a laugh and safety is seriously unacceptable. Curbs as high as mountains and corners tighter then a backstreet
alley in italy. Not good. Dangerous and prevents overtakes.
- Sound. understandable, but needs improvement. Not artificial, that's not the way to go. But there surely must be an
alternative. Or perhaps artificial sound is ok, but it needs to house a jetfighter-style sound. i dunno, i think this is the
biggest problem for electric car racing, atleast in a formula class. it lacks entertainment and emotion. for LM, that's not
such an issue. Formula? yes, huge problem.
- overall organisation. Can't find many positive points here. It's amateuristic. Just copy the F1-seriousness and you're done.
I understand it's a young series but it's rubbish for now. I'd rather see a race with R8 e-trons, i8's and tesla's instead of this.
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