The Lucas di Grassi Formula E Thread

dinizintheoven · Post by **dinizintheoven** » 13 Sep 2014, 09:34

I am slightly bored by... oh, wait, no, I'm not!

ROTR, I'm going for the whole e.Dams operation - never mind what Prost Junior is doing, there's also the small matter of The Camel's self-imposed practice crashes, DTP and unsuccessful attempt to rescue the fastest lap.

IIDOTR - I never knew Franck Montagny was that much of a charger. Honourable mention should be for the series itself - yes, it'll have its teething troubles, but it's actually happening and already I'm planning 2015 festival season around being in London for the e-Prix. We need - medically need - a F1 Rejects meetup there. Anyone who can go, do so.

Two months until the next race, though...

mediocre · Post by **mediocre** » 13 Sep 2014, 09:44

I'm probably gonna be at the Berlin ePrix.

andrew · Post by **andrew** » 13 Sep 2014, 09:46

Prost claiming he did not see Heidfeld,maybe if you looked out the other side of the car..
Plus Heidfeld was complaining about Prosts drving, even when upside down in the air

sw3ishida · Post by **sw3ishida** » 13 Sep 2014, 09:55

Given the race winner, the thread title has just become a lot more appropriate.

More to the point though, that was a pretty fun race. Perhaps more quietly interesting than explosively exciting, but it definitely shows the potential of the series and I look forward to the next one.

Ed24 · Post by **Ed24** » 13 Sep 2014, 10:15

What does Heidfeld have to do to win a major race...? Hope he gets lots of support from this and gets a Fan Boost in Malaysia.

Series was OK, not sure I'll schedule my Saturdays around it but if I'm home, worth a watch.

Reject of the Race: Sausage Kerbs

Zergon · Post by **Zergon** » 13 Sep 2014, 10:56

Quite nice first race overall, good thing that Heidfeld is ok, that crash looked quite scary.

Montagny surprised me, I never thought much about him but he had a great race and looked really good though I would give a slight minus on that first turn battle with his team mate were he almost forced Pic into wall and caused the jam that led to Senna´s crash. Still Montagny and Heidfeld were the two who had most impressive races IMO. On the not-so-great-start side, e.Dams certainly was the biggest disappointment, with Buemi having all kinds of trouble and losing the fastest lap to Takuma Sato on Amlin Aguri (which I belive is the only team with not a single top 10 position in any of the 5 test days or in the first race weekend) while Prost decided to throw the victory (or at least a second place) away in the last corner.

noiceinmydrink · Post by **noiceinmydrink** » 13 Sep 2014, 11:10

I thought that was a good race, especially considering the track layout wasn't brilliant. I'm starting to really like this Formula, one issue with it is the lack of noise; doesn't quite have the theatre provided by the roar of a motoracing engine but I don't mind it that much.

Ed24 wrote:Reject of the Race: Sausage Kerbs

Those bloody things need to be banned. This is far from the first time a horrendous accident has happened as a result of them. Someday those kerbs are going to seriously injure or, god forbid, kill someone.

watka · Post by **watka** » 13 Sep 2014, 11:20

Formula E gets the big thumbs up from me.

The good:
- FRANCK MONTAGNY
- The series is open and engaging, I like the way that it is as much about the fans as the competitors.
- It's attracted a good roster of drivers, rather than young drivers or has beens that no one has heard of.
- There was actually some overtaking despite the narrowness of the track. Plus, none of this blasting past on the straight, you've got to do it on the brakes.
- Battery management is an interesting aspect.
- I don't mind the sound of the cars, its kind of cool.
- The crash structures obviously work!

Room for improvement:
- I didn't expect the cars to be quite so slow. It really showed up on the overhead cams.
- The eJ can get a bit annoying.
- The pitstops I didn't quite follow. There is a minimum time to be spent in the pits and from the footage of Prost's stop he seemed to spend a fair amount of time sitting there before setting off. On that logic, everyone should have had roughly the same pitstop time so how did Heidfeld get ahead of the Abt cars?
- There needed to be graphics showing when drivers were using their fan boost and also for the drive-through penalties, which there were a lot of.

dr-baker · Post by **dr-baker** » 13 Sep 2014, 11:26

Jennie Gow looks nothing like how I imagined after previously only having heard her on the radio.

And, just like A1GP, the series proved the safety of their cars in a real-life situation during their first race weekend. I imagine that an image of that crash is what will illustrate most of the race reports in the days to come. After the crash, I noticed a pool of liquid under Heidfeld's car. I assume this was water used for cooling? I sincerely hope it wasn't battery acid!

Also, just like A1GP, a Brazilian wins the first race, but this time, it wasn't Nelson Piquet Jr...

I'm glad that the music did not make it onto the world feed, I think that I would have found it distracting. But no doubt they will 'fix' it for the next round and I will decide what I think about it when I see/hear it...

And I think that there should be a slightly bigger bias in the TV coverage towards those who have 'won' the Fan Boost. It is obvious by definition that those three drivers have been the most popular in the run-up to the race, and those who voted for those drivers will be following those drivers in particular. In other words, what on earth happened to Katherine Legge? Just as those pitting at the end of lap 13 came in, I noticed that she and Michela Cerruti were a lap down. I don't recall seeing them get lapped so at that point, I assumed that they had already pitted. But then it turned out that they pitted a lap later, at the end of lap 14. But anyway, go Super Aguri - very similar to their F1 performance - earning a place for Formula E Rejects!

Paul Hayes · Post by **Paul Hayes** » 13 Sep 2014, 12:10

I didn't watch it live, but have just caught it on the recording.

I enjoyed it a lot more than I had expected to, I have to admit. At the start I thought "ooooooo, they look a bit slow, and they sound a little annoying..."

But after a few laps I'd forgotten about all that, and was just enjoying the racing. I worried when we had the first safety car that it could end up being a little bitty, but fortunately that didn't happen and we had a good run.

The production of the whole thing was mixed - the music I wasn't sure about, although in the end I didn't actually find it at all obtrusive. The TV coverage made a complete mess of the pit stops, you hardly saw anything, but they did make up for it by doing a good job of raising the tension by cutting between the two pit garages in the closing laps.

The graphics need work with a lot of wrong information being displayed, but Nichols and Franchitti made for a likeable and engaging commentary team.

Doesn't Prost look frighteningly like his father when you can only see him through his helmet?

I thought Quick Nick was going to have him at the last corner there. You could see that Prost isn't really a driver in the same class as the ex-F1 racers, that was a great move from Heidfeld and a horrible nudge from Prost. I hope he gets an appropriate penalty for it.

Overall, I'd say the series was off to a strong start - it's just a shame that any momentum that could have been gained from that is killed stone dead by the long gap until the next race.

TomPryce · Post by **TomPryce** » 13 Sep 2014, 14:21

I love the racing... but...

Oh. My. God.

Whoever that woman is hosting the ITV coverage is exceptionally unqualified.

She called Formula 1 "1F" at one point.

She then says "we've not seen a Prost in P1 since '63 or something".

....

WHAT.

AndreaModa · Post by **AndreaModa** » 13 Sep 2014, 14:25

Paul Hayes wrote:The production of the whole thing was mixed - the music I wasn't sure about, although in the end I didn't actually find it at all obtrusive.

This

Paul Hayes wrote:The TV coverage made a complete mess of the pit stops, you hardly saw anything, but they did make up for it by doing a good job of raising the tension by cutting between the two pit garages in the closing laps.

This

Paul Hayes wrote:The graphics need work with a lot of wrong information being displayed, but Nichols and Franchitti made for a likeable and engaging commentary team.

Definitely this. We don't have the biggest TV in the world, so it was almost impossible to make out most of the graphics. White on lightish blue in tiny font isn't the way to go!

Paul Hayes wrote:Overall, I'd say the series was off to a strong start - it's just a shame that any momentum that could have been gained from that is killed stone dead by the long gap until the next race.

And also this. Poor planning from the organisers. The same thing happens with F1 powerboats - 1 race in Qatar in March, then nothing for the best part of a year, before a dash from October to December! They definitely need to work on the scheduling to keep the interest high.

Post by **Ataxia** » 13 Sep 2014, 14:32

TomPryce wrote:I love the racing... but...

Oh. My. God.

Whoever that woman is hosting the ITV coverage is exceptionally unqualified.

She called Formula 1 "1F" at one point.

She then says "we've not seen a Prost in P1 since '63 or something".

....

WHAT.

It appears staying in bed for an extra hour has paid off...Jennie Gow was not a particularly effectual presenter when she did MotoGP, so I decided to forgo the build-up.

With regards to the schedule and the other little tid-bits, sure, they need a little bit of work, but for a first attempt they were very good. They've got a couple of months to iron things out before the next race.

AndreaModa · Post by **AndreaModa** » 13 Sep 2014, 14:49

Yeah I'm not sure what it is with old Jennie but she can't seem to handle live telly. She was hopeless doing the MotoGP and she knew it. I seem to recall her not even seeing out the full season when she packed it in? I think she's done well being a reporter for 5 Live, but that requires just short bursts of talking and interviewing people with straightforward questions. Put her in front of a camera with a specific time to fill and she seems to loose it!

I'm ready to give her the benefit of the doubt though in this case. She's bound to get used to it as the series progresses, and to be fair, Mardenborough and Di Grassi's technical guy weren't exactly quality support for her. She could definitely use someone a bit stronger sat opposite her who has a bit of experience and can help her out.

I was more unimpressed with the girl they had reporting in Beijing. Seemed like she was trying way too hard in what was probably her first real live TV gig.

Shame they didn't make much use of Marc Priestly either. He's been tweeting loads of interesting stuff on Twitter so I think he has a lot to add. Not sure whether he'd be more use on the sofa with Jennie, but then he wouldn't be in the paddock around all the tech.

Overall though I think ITV4 did a pretty decent job. It could have been all too easy for them to just do a 10-15 minute build up and post race show, bookending the world feed of the race, so credit to them for going the extra mile. It will pay off in the long run.

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 13 Sep 2014, 15:10

I enjoyed the race, it was a race of firsts, not least of which was Nick Heidfeld crashing in a not boring way. The in-race music wasn't massively distracting but it did seem unnecessary, is it to make it feel like we're watching a video game? OI! I ALWAYS TURNED THE MUSIC OFF ON GRAN TURISMO DESPITE BEING A BIG FAN OF ASH. FEEDER WERE CRAP BUT THAT'S ANOTHER POST.

Anyway.

I'm sure followers of modern F1 would find it incredibly tedious, there wasnt much edge of the seat stuff going on, but I thought it was great nonetheless. Perhaps they could make the cars faster, 100 or so miles an hour doesn't exactly give you goosebumps. And to whoever started and named this thread if they'd like to give me some Lotto numbers for tonight Id sure appreciate it

I'm not nominating either Prost or Heidfeld for ROTR as they made it a bit more interesting. Instead, I'll nominate Legge for not keeping within the track limits a couple of times. Come on, love, you're not really going fast enough to make errors like that, are you?

Shizuka · Post by **Shizuka** » 13 Sep 2014, 15:20

So glad they quickly got through this.

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 13 Sep 2014, 15:44

Shizuka wrote:

So glad they quickly got through this.

And so the hacks writing explosive articles with titles like "Prost and Heidfeld Bitter Feud!" sadly hit delete....

dr-baker · Post by **dr-baker** » 13 Sep 2014, 16:51

CoopsII wrote:
Shizuka wrote:

So glad they quickly got through this.

And so the hacks writing explosive articles with titles like "Prost and Heidfeld Bitter Feud!" sadly hit delete....

Can you imagine if it were Prost and Senna though? What would Lewis have to say if it had been? Don't forget that McLaren do build parts of the car too...

LionZoo · Post by **LionZoo** » 13 Sep 2014, 17:12

dr-baker wrote:Jennie Gow looks nothing like how I imagined after previously only having heard her on the radio.

dr-baker leading with the important stuff. Never change <3

As for the race, sadly I had written it off as a gimmick. I may need to watch the next one.

Paul Hayes · Post by **Paul Hayes** » 13 Sep 2014, 17:19

CoopsII wrote:I'm sure followers of modern F1 would find it incredibly tedious

Well, I'm a follower of modern F1, and I enjoyed it!

Paul Hayes · Post by **Paul Hayes** » 13 Sep 2014, 17:20

AndreaModa wrote:Definitely this. We don't have the biggest TV in the world, so it was almost impossible to make out most of the graphics. White on lightish blue in tiny font isn't the way to go!

I hadn't thought of that, as I have quite a big TV, but you're right - it's perhaps not the clearest combination in the world.

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 13 Sep 2014, 17:46

Paul Hayes wrote:
CoopsII wrote:I'm sure followers of modern F1 would find it incredibly tedious

Well, I'm a follower of modern F1, and I enjoyed it!

I guess we all are which just highlights how idiotic my comment was :lol:

I was thinking more of the people who have thought and continue to think F1 needs more rules to make it better. FE must seem positively prehistoric in comparison.

Pointrox · Post by **Pointrox** » 13 Sep 2014, 18:03

OK, just watched the whole race. And what a great race that was!
I wasn't really prejudiced towards electric cars but never thought such series would deliver a good race. And yet here it is, even if it's without the proper soundtrack.

Franck Montagny wins the IIDOTR, hands down. Pulled off some great moves and managed to maintain his position till the very end. Also KARUN CHANDHOK!
Nico Prost... what was that? I would say something about Canamasas, but Prof's son is not an asshat and can admit making a mistake. Gotta give him credit for handling it like a gentleman, since it doesn't seem to be an obvious thing these days.
But ht's a ROTR nevertheless. On par with Trulli GP.

Overall, it was a great race, albeit a bit slow, hitting 200 km/h at best. Definitely a fun thing to watch once major series will end by October/November, though.

Barbazza · Post by **Barbazza** » 13 Sep 2014, 18:25

Well, we certainly named the thread correctly, didn't we!

Overall, having watched the live version of the broadcast on delay earlier....it was OK. When they all started moving away extremely slowly on the parade lap (apparently they have to, for mechanical reasons!) I did wonder exactly what I was going to see. The answer was - something similar to one of the middling F1 races, with some excitement at the start and end and a bit of a lull in the middle.

The coverage was, however, abysmal. Many times things happened and we got no replays (why did all those drivers get drive-through penalties? why did Sato's car stop? and how did it get going again?! why did Buemi's wing fall off?) and other times they went overboard. The graphics were showing incorrect battery percentages for most of the cars after they made their pit stops, and this is a major part of the strategy! As others have pointed out, the pit stops were not covered or explained very well. And also I agree that the fan boost was not covered properly - when the drivers in question are using it, I don't expect them necessarily to be on screen if something more interesting is happening, but why not flash up a massive graphic on screen so that we at least know they're using it.

As for ITV's coverage, I fast forwarded through most of that and as I will most probably be watching none of the races live, I won't see much of it in the future. I was a bit surprised that they didn't have a major driver in the studio. I was more annoyed by that useless bint at the track than Jennie Gow to be honest - she seemed to be from the Louise Goodman school of interviewing sadly.

Post by **DemocalypseNow** » 13 Sep 2014, 19:05

The race was promising but the coverage very very poor - they may need to poach some production staff from FOM to liven up the TV feed a bit more!

Post by **mario** » 13 Sep 2014, 20:08

dinizintheoven wrote:I am slightly bored by... oh, wait, no, I'm not!

ROTR, I'm going for the whole e.Dams operation - never mind what Prost Junior is doing, there's also the small matter of The Camel's self-imposed practice crashes, DTP and unsuccessful attempt to rescue the fastest lap.

IIDOTR - I never knew Franck Montagny was that much of a charger. Honourable mention should be for the series itself - yes, it'll have its teething troubles, but it's actually happening and already I'm planning 2015 festival season around being in London for the e-Prix. We need - medically need - a F1 Rejects meetup there. Anyone who can go, do so.

Two months until the next race, though...

Well, it's going to be heavily dependent on whether or not they can actually get the circuit location sorted first - I might be mistaken, but I think that the final location and layout has still not yet been confirmed for the London event. Still, it's a tempting suggestion - hopefully it won't fizzle out by the time June 2015 comes around.

Barbazza wrote:Well, we certainly named the thread correctly, didn't we!

Overall, having watched the live version of the broadcast on delay earlier....it was OK. When they all started moving away extremely slowly on the parade lap (apparently they have to, for mechanical reasons!) I did wonder exactly what I was going to see. The answer was - something similar to one of the middling F1 races, with some excitement at the start and end and a bit of a lull in the middle.

The coverage was, however, abysmal. Many times things happened and we got no replays (why did all those drivers get drive-through penalties? why did Sato's car stop? and how did it get going again?! why did Buemi's wing fall off?) and other times they went overboard. The graphics were showing incorrect battery percentages for most of the cars after they made their pit stops, and this is a major part of the strategy! As others have pointed out, the pit stops were not covered or explained very well. And also I agree that the fan boost was not covered properly - when the drivers in question are using it, I don't expect them necessarily to be on screen if something more interesting is happening, but why not flash up a massive graphic on screen so that we at least know they're using it.

As for ITV's coverage, I fast forwarded through most of that and as I will most probably be watching none of the races live, I won't see much of it in the future. I was a bit surprised that they didn't have a major driver in the studio. I was more annoyed by that useless bint at the track than Jennie Gow to be honest - she seemed to be from the Louise Goodman school of interviewing sadly.

That's the general impression that I've seen from other commentators - that whilst the race itself showed flashes of promise, the overall execution lacked the professional polish that you would expect of a more established series. Now, that is perhaps inevitable at a stage when the series is still casting around to establish its own identity and present itself to the world, but at the same time being able to offer a consistent, engaging experience right from the get go is going to be crucial in getting the series up and running if it is going to survive once the initial novelty of the events wear off.

Backmarker · Post by **Backmarker** » 13 Sep 2014, 20:17

Jennie Gow is quite good on twitter, but I don't think I've ever heard/seen her presenting anything before. I woke up with the intention of watching the race, but I managed to miss it, due to a combination of not being able to find a stream and also the Formula E website being slower than the racing itself, so I couldn't get there to find the race time.

That Prost-Heidfeld incident shouldn't have caused such a big crash, despite Prost being stupid, those sausage kerbs have a lot to answer for. Glad Heidfeld was okay, he was scarily close to his head coming into contact with the corner of the catch fencing, which could have easily been game over.

Post by **tommykl** » 13 Sep 2014, 20:33

dinizintheoven wrote:Honourable mention should be for the series itself - yes, it'll have its teething troubles, but it's actually happening and already I'm planning 2015 festival season around being in London for the e-Prix. We need - medically need - a F1 Rejects meetup there. Anyone who can go, do so.

Late June... My exams will be over, but my tenancy agreement won't, meaning that I'd be free to come for once

dr-baker · Post by **dr-baker** » 13 Sep 2014, 20:58

LionZoo wrote:
dr-baker wrote:Jennie Gow looks nothing like how I imagined after previously only having heard her on the radio.

dr-baker leading with the important stuff. Never change <3.

You know that I will never change!

And ROTR is definitely either Nicolas Prost (since when did he become Nico instead of Nicolas?) or those draught excluder/sausage kerbs - a major safety hazard.

Post by **DemocalypseNow** » 14 Sep 2014, 00:22

tommykl wrote:
dinizintheoven wrote:Honourable mention should be for the series itself - yes, it'll have its teething troubles, but it's actually happening and already I'm planning 2015 festival season around being in London for the e-Prix. We need - medically need - a F1 Rejects meetup there. Anyone who can go, do so.

Late June... My exams will be over, but my tenancy agreement won't, meaning that I'd be free to come for once

My girlfriend is the biggest Nick Heidfeld fan in the universe, and sounds utterly determined to go, so I'll probably end up being dragged along as well :roll:

OsellaFA1L · Post by **OsellaFA1L** » 14 Sep 2014, 02:08

I have to say, I loved the race. It was a bit rejectful and there are and few problems to iron out. But It was truly fascinating. The track is shite though, but so is every Chinese street circuit

W12 · Post by **W12** » 14 Sep 2014, 04:22

I had a dream last night where Formula E's raced at the old Helsinki Thunder Street Circuit. Today it struck my mind. They need a race in Finland (in the summer, of course). Everyone knows F1 is too expensive, but why not Formula E? Here's the circuit, by the way: 1995-1996-1997

AxelP800 · Post by **AxelP800** » 14 Sep 2014, 06:32

!Beware of controversial opinion!

The track is very challenging, tight corners, some straights, and unique 4 chicanes which provides challenges. Though the start/finish length looks hard to have more than 20 cars. The unique pitlane prooved to be well, unique, able to maximise the space use. The few amount of run-off works as it punished the drivers. That is street circuit racing, narrow track and barriers on your side. The pit exit looks too long, but I understand why it designed like that: to avoid racing line on the turn 1 exit.

Some things that I would change to the circuit is last corner I will make it earlier by 10 centimeters, while the ramp kerbs could change to grass

Dom_Wings · Post by **Dom_Wings** » 14 Sep 2014, 08:37

Ed24 wrote:What does Heidfeld have to do to win a major race...? Hope he gets lots of support from this and gets a Fan Boost in Malaysia.

He did actually win the Petit Le Mans last year, but that's pretty much it

Bleu · Post by **Bleu** » 14 Sep 2014, 18:52

W12 wrote:I had a dream last night where Formula E's raced at the old Helsinki Thunder Street Circuit. Today it struck my mind. They need a race in Finland (in the summer, of course). Everyone knows F1 is too expensive, but why not Formula E? Here's the circuit, by the way: 1995-1996-1997

Too bad that part of the circuit is nowadays closed industrial area I think.

good_Ralf · Post by **good_Ralf** » 14 Sep 2014, 19:36

Nico Prost has been given a ten place-penalty for the next race.

Dj_bereta · Post by **Dj_bereta** » 15 Sep 2014, 04:39

I forgot to watch the race, but what Nicolas Prost did!? Rubbish, rubbish move. ROTR.

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 15 Sep 2014, 08:23

good_Ralf wrote:Nico Prost has been given a ten place-penalty for the next race.

The next race is so far away they'll have forgotten about that by then.

AxelP800 · Post by **AxelP800** » 15 Sep 2014, 13:59

CoopsII wrote:
good_Ralf wrote:Nico Prost has been given a ten place-penalty for the next race.

The next race is so far away they'll have forgotten about that by then.

I have decided I will vote fanboost for Putrajaya to Nicolas Prost for the great sportsmanship. The only thing now is I have to search my password..... until the voting reopen in time

mrfakeboullier · Post by **mrfakeboullier** » 15 Sep 2014, 20:03

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say if Heidfeld didn't hit the sausage curb then he could have won even with a damaged front right suspension. Also, can I humbly suggest the track in Bristol (UK Bristol not NASCAR American Bristol) I designed here for the TBA race?