Jaguar Racing has announced that Formula E’s support series, the I-Pace eTrophy Series will not continue after this year, due to the on-going pandemic of COVID-19.
However, despite the eTrophy Series ending, Jaguar Racing still plans to move forward with their Formula E team that fields drivers, Mitch Evans and James Calado.
Team Director, James Barclay says, that while we enjoyed two great seasons, that have looked at other options and decided to not continue the league.
“The series has realised many of the targets we set out to achieve,” Barclay said. “However, during these unprecedented times of the coronavirus pandemic, we have reviewed our strategy and made the decision to withdraw the Jaguar I-PACE eTROPHY series after two successful seasons. We remain fully committed to electric motorsport and our Jaguar Racing Formula E programme as an important part of our transition to electric mobility and Destination Zero. I’m looking forward to the Formula E and eTROPHY seasons resuming if and when it is safe for our team, partners and fans to do so.”
Nonetheless, the series was able to make some history by during its short-lived time, as they were the first battery electric race cars to compete, which was based on a production vehicle. Even so, the series learned that the eTrophy owners can earn up to 20km on a full charge. According to the update that came out in December of last-year, the eTrophy cars can have battery management, all-wheel drive that is supposed to increase range, and thermal systems.
“Jaguar are fantastic partners on and off the track,” said Amie Reigle, the Chief Executive Officer of Formula E. “The success of the eTROPHY in taking the pioneering technology Jaguar developed through Formula E and applying it to high performance production cars is a testament to their branding and engineering capabilities. At Formula E, we’re delighted to have supported this project which showcases how we enable our partners to leverage our platform to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles. We look forward to continuing to work with Jaguar Racing on their Formula E programme.”
The series has made some history of its own over the last couple of years.
Some of those notes include giving the opportunities to drivers to compete such as, Reema Juffali, Celia Martin. This also includes the first-disabled driver Takuma Aoki.
Katherine Legge also made her name known in the series by becoming the first woman to win by winning at Mexico City in 2019.
