Are we there yet? Growing, shrieking pains
CEBU, Philippines - Last Saturday, the Federation Internationale de I’Automobile (FIA) officially launched its latest motorsports farce called the Formula E. For those who have not heard of this, Formula E is, according to its official website, a new FIA single-seater championship and the world’s first fully-electric racing series. The very first Formula E race, which was held in Beijing, China, featured ten teams with two drivers per team.
Former Formula One drivers like Jarno Trulli and Nick Heidfeld lent some credibility to this racing circus, with the organizers banking on some form of nostalgia with the names Senna (Bruno) and Prost (Nicolas) being on the same grid. Unfortunately, that was about as prestigious as it got. The rest was like a trip to the dentist’s office. No, I mean, it really did feel like a trip to the dentist’s office.
The sound that these “race cars” made were eerily reminiscent of that drill that dentists use when performing a root canal. Honestly, a root canal would be ten times more bearable and pleasurable than sitting through that farce of a grand prix. Even the dogs were howling and barking every time the eardrum-shattering sound of whirring servos were amplified through the television speakers. I could imagine some poor canine banging its head on the pavement trying to block out the sound.
As for the race itself, I never realized how long a 3.44 kilometer distance was until the race broadcaster replayed the race start four times and two racing incidents twice. The time it took for all those highlights to be repeated twice over was around the same time it took these “race cars” to do one lap. If you think I’m exaggerating, the competitors needed about an hour and a half to finish a twenty-five lap race. Aside from the last corner, last lap collision between then race leader Prost and Heidfeld, the only other exciting thing to watch was the pit lane action which involved drivers jumping from one electric car to another as the rules require them to.
This race didn’t feature pit crews running to the pit box to change tires and such. This race featured two guys from the entire pit crew buckling in the driver and refitting the steering wheel. I can envision the rest of the crew sitting around the coffee table laughing at the two guys, who lost a bet the previous day, hard at work strapping down the driver.
As a friend of mine kept telling me throughout the race, these are still the necessary birth pains that the new series has to go through. As current regulations do not allow teams to modify their “race cars” much, we are looking at a long, screeching series ahead.
I know that this new “racing” series’ goal is the promotion of clean energy and sustainability, thus the use of electric vehicles. Here’s my take on how to achieve that: Take all the eco-friendly brouhaha that is plaguing Formula One and stick it up the battery packs of this farcical series. Maybe all these so-called eco-boosts that these dumbed down Formula One cars have will give this new circus some excitement. Oh, and Jean Todt and Bernie Ecclestone, give us back our turbo-charged, gas-guzzling V-12 powered Formula One cars and let them all race to the limit each lap. I’d rather hear the booming and cracking exhaust sounds of these cars over the sound of fingernails on chalkboard any day.
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