The build-up to Season 7 of Formula E is well underway and not many teams have as much potential behind them right now as Jaguar Racing does. The team already has a strong driver pairing for 2021 in the form of Mitch Evans and Sam Bird (who moved to Jaguar from Envision Virgin Racing) and results from pre-season testing in Valencia have been looking promising.
Mitch Evans finished the weekend with the fifth-best lap time overall, with both drivers setting strong times from the very first day. The team completed 370 laps overall of the Circuit Ricardo Tormo with Bird completing over 197 laps and Evans completing 176.
“Testing has been really interesting for me as a new driver with Jaguar Racing,” said Sam Bird. “We’ve learned a lot about the car – the hardware, the software and the systems – and we’ve understood what works well and how we can make the Jaguar I-TYPE 5 go faster.
“Overall it’s been a really useful test. I’m very happy with the way that I’ve integrated with the team – from my new engineers to my new mechanics, everyone has been really welcoming and I’m looking forward to going into Santiago with lots of positive learnings from this test.”
“It’s been a really big few days for us,” said Mitch Evans. “We had some technical glitches on day one but the team worked hard to fix these. We’ve been able to run for a good amount of time in the last few days, especially today, and I think we’ve made great progress.
“It’s really tight competition here, it always is, but I’m happy with where we’ve finished. We’ve made a number of adaptations to the car and although there is a lot to analyse between now and Santiago, I’m feeling confident that we’re heading in a good direction.”
Jaguar Racing Team Director James Barclay is feeling cautiously optimistic about how well the new Jaguar car and refreshed Jaguar team has been doing in pre-season testing. “To finish today with Mitch in P5 was a good indication that we’ve got some promising car speed but we need to keep working hard behind the scenes before the first races in January.
“We’re really pleased with the progress we’ve made here in Valencia but there is still time to improve before the first race. We can’t wait to go racing again in January.”
Jaguar Racing’s Technical Manager Phil Charles expressed similar sentiments, saying that “We feel like we’re in a good position going into Santiago but we will keep pushing with our final preparations.“
Jaguar Racing will be hoping to be one of the front-runners once racing resumes on 16 January 2021 in Santiago, Chile. With such a strong driver pairing as Mitch Evans and Sam Bird, Jaguar Racing will definitely be one of the teams to watch in Season 7.
