Formula E’s 2019-2020 season calendar has been approved by the World Motorsport Council, despite three clashes with the World Endurance Championship. Additionally, new regulations have banned the use of dual-motor power trains, forcing Nissan to redesign theirs in order to compete next season.
Formula E had previously worked with the FIA and WMSC to ensure there were not clashes between its calendar and WEC’s, as several drivers share duties across the two series and a clash in Season 3 had seen Sebastien Buemi lose out on a double-header weekend in the championship fight.However, the series look set to clash again next year on three separate occasions.
On the 14th December there will be a Formula E race in an as-yet-unconfirmed location, clashing with the 8h of Bahrain. A race in an unspecified Chinese location clashes with 1000 miles of Sebring on 20th/21st of March, Seoul round clashes with 6h of Spa on the 2nd/3rd of May.
London is confirmed to be double-header finale again, with Seoul being added to the schedule, Marrakech and the Swiss round seeming to have disappeared. The season-opening race in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, is set to be a double-header.
Approved 2019-2020 ABB FIA Formula E Calendar:
22 November 2019 – Saudi Arabia – Ad Diriyah
23 November 2019 – Saudi Arabia – Ad Diriyah
14 December 2019 – TBC – TBC
18 January 2020 – Chile – Santiago de Chile
15 February 2020 – Mexico – Mexico City
01 March 2020 – China – Hong Kong
21 March 2020 – China – TBC
4 April 2020 – Italy – Rome
18 April 2020 – France – Paris
3 May 2020 – South Korea – Seoul
30 May 2020 – Germany – Berlin
20 June 2020 – USA – New York
25 July 2020 – UK – London
26 July 2020 – UK – London*
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Despite a strongly rumoured St Petersburg and Budapest race, the TBC slot is highly likely to be in the Southern Hemisphere, owing to the timing.
The World Motorsport Council also announced that the Technical Regulations had been modified “reducing the maximum number of MGUs (rotating electromechanical power converters) from two to one.”
This follows controversy in the paddock regarding a perceived advantage – and alleged additional energy storage – in Nissan e.Dams’ dual powertrain. Dual MGU systems had been used previously but had not delivered a performance advantage, due to the additional weight of a two-motor system.
Only Nissan e.Dams currently use a dual motor system and will need to redesign in time for collective testing at the start of Season 6. Normally, manufacturers would have moved on to designing Season 7’s powertrain, by this stage in the season, so this is a significant impact to the team and Nissan’s development.
Other modifications to the sporting regulations will see the race timing clock stopped during any red flag periods – and drivers to lose 1kWh of available energy for every minute spent driving behind the safety car or under Full Course Yellows, in order to restore energy management and efficiency to the racing.
Additionally, drivers will not be permitted to activate Attack Mode under Full Course Yellow and one championship point will be awarded to the fastest driver in each of the four qualifying groups, as well as the three points awarded to the driver who claims pole position.
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minnis (@minnis)
14th June 2019, 19:57
WHY?! This always produced an excellent end to any race!
Sloppy Shades (@sloppysmusic)
14th June 2019, 20:31
The regulators are doing what they know best. Regulating all excitement out of motorsports. If it looks good on a spreadsheet it gets voted in.
Hazel Southwell (@hazelsouthwell)
15th June 2019, 9:53
@minnis
Does it though? The most thrilling race ends have been eg: Santiago, Mexico, Rome, Monaco… all of which went down to energy. Formula E shouldn’t be a flat-out drag race to the end just because they’ve been pootling around behind the safety car for ten minutes.
Verrarista
14th June 2019, 20:55
What a joke.
GtisBetter (@)
14th June 2019, 21:39
It’s quite an achievement for a championship that races 75% of the time when almost all other motorsports are on winterbreak to clash 3 times with a championship that has 8 rounds all year.
anon
14th June 2019, 22:20
@passingisoverrated, mind you, both Formula E and the WEC are unusual in that they both have seasons which run across two different calendar years, which is probably why there are an unusually high number of races clashing between Formula E and the WEC.
If you look at the clashes, one is in mid-December, which is when most other series will have shut down, whilst the other is in March, which is when most series have only just begun to start up again.
The clash with the Spa 6 Hours race is also in part because of the way that the WEC calendar works – they’ve tended to run the Spa 6 Hours around then because it is the first chance for teams to run their low downforce aero packages ahead of the Le Mans test day, which usually occurs in early June, and because it keeps the Spa 6 Hours race reasonably far ahead of the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Unicron (@unicron2002)
14th June 2019, 22:39
Do you know how many cities have hosted Formula E rounds in all 5 seasons?
One: Berlin, on 2 different circuits. A small handful have done 4 (Paris and Mexico City come to mind), but most are one-offs or ‘two-offs’. Formula E sure has a high turnover of events.
They do a good job of promoting how popular Formula E is with cities when new rounds are added, but stay quiet about the rounds that can’t seem to make it work for whatever reasons.
Putrajaya, Beijing, Punta del Este, Battersea Park, Long Beach, Miami, Moscow….
Big Joe
15th June 2019, 0:51
@unicron2002
City people are going off motorsport full-stop. Increasing congestion and noise in their rat race. They are either not interested or many actually oppose.
Formula E isnt powerful enough to overide the people who actually live there, with money and glamour like F1 does.
Neil (@neilosjames)
14th June 2019, 23:36
Three week break, then a five-week break, then a four-week break to start the season.
Why? How are people meant to get involved when the championship switches off for a month or so at the time when it’s supposed to be building momentum for the rest of the year? If you don’t have enough races for a nine-month calendar, don’t have a nine-month calendar…
bosyber (@bosyber)
16th June 2019, 9:53
Yeah, have to mostly agree with that @neilosjames, with how hard it still is to find (I think eurosport now in Germany, but, often eurosport 2, which I do not have, and am not going to pay too much extra for for a few of the FE races, and bits of LeMans (when I might not be there to watch, or am sleeping), it’s very distracting to also have to check ‘oh, wait, after that month absence, I missed the next FE race, oh well, never mind’ – hard to make it feel like a single season that way.
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
16th June 2019, 18:58
Excellent effort there for two unconfirmed rounds (TBC) to be confirmed to clash!
That is madness. Let’s hope the TBC rounds fall through.