Damien Smith
Jaguar has a rocky record in motorsport, beyond its storied sports car legacy, built at Le Mans in the 1950s and then enhanced so sensationally in Group C during the 1980s. Elsewhere, it has been patchy – at best. Let’s not linger on the Formula 1 humiliation at the start of this millennium, an ill-starred campaign mangled by spectacular mismanagement from its then parent company, Ford. No wonder the British brand stayed away from the grids for so long.
Yet for the past seven years, Jaguar has been back on track – although you can be forgiven if you haven’t noticed. Jaguar Land Rover’s compulsion to electrify the leaping cat led it to Formula E, a curate’s egg of a series that has attracted major manufacturer investment but only a sliver of the interest that F1 generates.
Some people feel – and I’m among them – that Jaguar and any form of single-seater motorsport remains an awkward mismatch. Still, full electrification is where it’s at for Jaguar, so Formula E it is. To be fair, it has dug in and persevered, rising from early seasons of chronic underachievement to earn respect as a genuine front-runner. But will Jaguar ever earn the credit that it’s due for that commitment?
GEN3 BREAKTHROUGH
Jaguar joined Formula E for its third season in 2016. Now in the series’ ninth, the new and more powerful Gen3 cars have promised to raise the stakes. As you may have read back in January, I wasn’t entirely convinced after the opener in Mexico City. But since then, the racing has been little short of sensational, particularly on a trio of new street tracks in Hyderabad (India), Cape Town (South Africa) and, most recently, São Paulo (Brazil). These venues have showcased Formula E at its best, and I don’t think it’s a stretch to state that Gen3 might well represent its coming of age, as it was meant to.
Jaguar endured a disastrous start to its campaign, though. In India, Sam Bird, a Formula E veteran since the first season, embarrassed himself by taking out team-mate Mitch Evans, and then he didn’t even start in South Africa after crashing heavily in practice.
The clear promise in Jaguar’s new I-Type 6 has finally come good, though. Porsche had been the dominant force this season, winning four of the first five rounds, but in Brazil a cagey race of careful energy management evolved into a gripping shootout between Evans, Bird and the Jaguarpowered Envision Virgin entry of Nick Cassidy.
In the first half, the ePrix had echoes of a cycle
