Formula Weeeeeee! Flat out in the GenBeta prototype

Formula E says all the metrics point in the right direction, with audience share swelling, sold-out grandstands and fanbase feedback overtaking NASCAR and MotoGP. But thanks to Netflix, it’s Formula One that’s been catapulted from a nerdy purgatory into a worldwide phenomenon of memes and heartthrobs. So you probably hadn’t noticed that this year’s Portland ePrix had 403 overtakes. And that ahead of this season’s penultimate round, any one of four FE drivers had a title shout. F1 hasn’t enjoyed such a wide open season climax in a decade.

Photography: John Wycherley and Olgun Kordal

Meanwhile, Formula E cars themselves aren’t what they used to be. Remember 2014, when the gangly newbies mustered less power than a Boxster and their batteries couldn’t last an entire race? Forget fresh tyres, the drivers literally had to pit for a whole car halfway through each event, clumsily unbuckling themselves and sprinting across the garage to be belted into a freshly charged twin.

That unedifying spectacle was purged in 2018 when the Gen2 cars arrived, teaming a Dallara chassis with a McLaren engineered battery. Those cars were again superseded in 2023 with this Gen3 car. Part stealth bomber, part Christmas tree. Now developing up to 469bhp and capable of six times more regen than the early cars (explaining the 10p pieces behind the front wheels and the total absence of rear brakes), a Gen3 racer is good for in excess of 200mph and 0–62mph in under 2.8 seconds.

Being zero emissions, it was the perfect joker in the pack for Speed Week. So, we dialled up Formula E and asked if anyone had a spare car. Perhaps Mercedes (who ditched the series after winning it twice) had one gathering dust in a warehouse. Or Audi, who followed BMW’s works team out the door in 2021.

“Actually, we’ve got our own car,” they replied. “And you’ll prefer ours. Ours is faster.”

There’s nothing quite like a racing car that’s allowed to break the rules which govern it. Enter the GenBeta – a potential test bed for where Formula E goes next. Four-wheel drive, for starters. The front motor-generator, which is usually only on power harvesting duty, is allowed to contribute some grunt here, so thanks to an uprated battery this £1.3m one-off generates over 530bhp and gets off the line faster on softer, stickier tyres. Handy, when you want to break a world record. Formula E driver Jake Hughes recently guided this very machine to 135.9mph on a 346-metre track within the walls of an exhibition centre in London’s Docklands, shattering the indoor land speed record but not ExCeL’s skirting boards.

Gratifyingly for someone whose single seater experience is go-karts and 20 minutes in a BAC Mono nine years ago, it’s simple to operate. Left foot on the near-solid brake pedal, right foot on the long throttle. Click both paddles for neutral, then left for reverse or right for drive. No DRS, no charge modes. Just stop, go and steer. It’s not comfy though. My hips wedge in the carbon seat before my backside touches the bottom, and my knees rest up against the underside of the nose while the steering wheel bumps into my thighs beyond a quarter turn of lock. It’s a relief to realise the reason I’m not a successful racing driver owes little to my talent vacuum and can be entirely blamed on the shape of my skeleton.

Like all racing cars, the GenBeta doesn’t like dawdling. As we set up the cameras, it’s getting chilly. Its French handler gestures to a readout on the steering wheel: 37.5°C and falling. Battery temperature. Any colder and the car will lose performance and shut down. It’s imperative to generate some heat. The best way to do that? A couple of brisk laps.

The fact I half-spin it on my first lap isn’t a shock to anyone. The fact I make it six corners before spinning it is a surprise to me. What have we learned? The unassisted steering is heavy and I can’t get much leverage on it before thunderthighs cost me an apex. The brakes are stupendous despite barely being there and the throttle travel is very long indeed.

That was my downfall. I forgot that bit in the briefing where they warned me how it’s calibrated. The further you press the right pedal, the more the rear motor takes over from the front one, as the car presumes you’ve got plenty of tyre temperature and confidence. I had neither, so it looped around, and knocked one of the bespoke 3D-printed endplates off into the gravel.

Freshly versed in new French curse words, I venture out again just as the Gotlandring starts being peppered by a late afternoon shower. But helpfully, this isn’t a slicks ’n’ wings special that needs to be driven at a certain lick to avoid falling off a downforce plateau. Formula E cars aren’t versed in dirty air and DRS. I can sort of imagine how you might go wheel to wheel and race someone in one of these.

Whatever language you choose, it’s swearword fast. It whines and whooshes and buzzes with energy. Certainly sounds angry enough to be a racecar when you’re strapped into its core, peering around the halo that your brain quickly learns to see ‘through’. I spend half an hour feeling the car out, trying to absorb and process the messages it’s constantly feeding back. No more spins, happily. But Formula E hasn’t called back so I can’t imagine my data was too tasty. Build me a wider chassis?

Despite it body shaming me, then spitting me off for some unscheduled disassembly, it seems to me that the engineers behind Formula E have done their jobs superbly, and improbably it’s the marketing that’s lagging. The rate of technical progress is wild. Formula E’s second decade will be defined by whether or not the viewing public, not the cars, are finally up to speed.