Gul Panag Shares Her Practice Of Driving Mahindra Racing’s Formula E Car

Highlights

My every day rail at home is a German automobile that weighs one thousand eight hundred kgs and produces a decent one hundred forty bhp. When Dilbagh Gill, Team Principal Mahindra Racing Formula E Team, invited me to train and drive something that weighed seven hundred sixty kgs and produced over two hundred seventy bhp, I cleared my calendar and grabbed the chance with both arms! Like most auto enthusiasts I am also a fan of motorsport. After all, a lot of the technology in our street cars comes from R&D that went into cars meant for the tracks. Formula E represents something unique to me. As someone who is a user and a sultry advocate of electrified mobility, for me it’s a ideal marriage of motorsport and the future.

So it’s natural that I have been following Formula E from inception. Over the last two and a half years (it’s now in its third season) I have gone to several races and every season finale. It’s a matter of fine pride for me to see an Indian team in what is arguably the most technologically advanced race in the FIA calendar. Fairly unlike a conventional speed race or an stamina race, Formula E is a unique test of not only the driver’s capability to drive, but also to manage the car’s energy resource. The energy allocation is just a little lower than what is required to finish the race under total power and so the driver is expected to use the resources at his disposition wisely and then also regenerate some.

Gul Panag at the Mahindra development facility in Barcelona

I reached Barcelona and went straight to the team garage at the Mahindra development facility where I met Joan Orus, the team Manager. Orus instantly gave me a brief tour of the operations and I eventually got to touch and feel carbon fibre, and even witnessed the fabrication of a part! But soon it was time for me to get into the simulator. My instructor for the day was Felix Rosenqvist, one of the two Mahindra Racing drivers. Now a simulator may look like a joy movie game but it truly isn’t. As a pilot who does a lot of simulator hours every month to keep my skill levels up to date, I have immense respect for simulators as a key training and testing contraption that’s cost effective, efficient and very ‘green’.

Simulators are key training and testing instrument that help keep the driver’s abilities up-to-date.

However, nothing ready me for how challenging it truly was, and you can click on this movie to see why! Felix had warned me that it was going to be awkward on account of spatial disorientation – i.e. when the there is a mismatch inbetween visual perception and actual physical movement. The discomfort notwithstanding, I got a basic understanding of the dynamics and a fair grip on the treating of the car.

Driving on a track is something I was already familiar with having driven formula cars (Formula Renault and an F1), raced in the VW Polo Cup and having done a few track driving & railing clinics including at the California Superbike School. I am also a regular juror at the annual NDTV Car and Bike Awards, and that jury meet is also held at the BIC track.

The M4 Electro will be Mahindra Racing’s challenger in the upcoming season Four

The next day I had my chance to drive the M4Electro – Mahindra Racing’s season four challenger. The day began cold and early and I was glad to be switched into my bespoke Sparco fire-retardant race suit. Mahindra Racing uses the picturesque Circuit Calafat track by the Mediterranean in Catalonia, for its testing. It is about two hours from Barcelona, and one of many tracks in the region. Owing to the year round pleasant weather and abundance of tracks, this part of Spain is popular with motorsport teams to test and tweak their cars.

We had the Calafat track to ourselves for the day. The primary purpose was of course Felix driving and testing next season’s car so the team engineers could collect valuable telemetric data (the teams get only fifteen testing days in a year). I was to get a few laps in inbetween Felix’s time on the track. Felix very first took me in a regular street car (the XUV500 surprise, surprise!) to check out the track. It seemed very familiar. And instantly my respect for the simulator went up a few notches! Felix did a few laps, the car came back into the garage and soon it was time for me to get strapped in. Bringing the car back securely was my very first priority, keeping myself safe, the 2nd. Like any electrical car, the transmission instantly sends power to the wheels. I was hesitant to use the throttle knowing that it did zero to one hundred kmph in three seconds! While slightly slower than an F1 car, it’s an incredible achievement given that R&D teams have had just over two years to get here. Imagine what will happen in a decade! The very first lap had me very restrained. I was hesitant at the corners. While I did go throttle to the floor on the straight opens up, I braked way too early (something my friend and co-juror at the CNB awards Rayomand Banaji, always chides me for). The 2nd lap was better and the next even better. When I came back into the garage, it was with adrenaline pumping! Such a rush! That was till Dilbagh (who had been watching me from the tower) told me that I had to cut twenty seconds from my timing in the next set of laps! I was given a utter debrief and sent back for another set of laps soon after.

Time for a accomplish debrief before hitting the track again

More comfy with the car and the track, and armed with a newfound confidence, my 2nd set of laps were better. I shoved firmer on the straight spreads, braking later when injecting corners and took them much quicker. And I just didn’t want it to end! I could have shoved on for still more laps. But the car needed to be driven by Felix and not by me! I exited the track with a mighty heart. As I was getting shoved into the garage, a beaming Dilbagh told me I’d actually knocked off over twenty seconds in my final lap! And that was the icing on the cake. Since at the end of the run I had in fact attained the targeted time – Mahindra Racing even introduced me with my very own model M3Electro.

So I feel truly privileged and honoured at this tremendous chance. I drove the future. This technology will find its way into my electrical car in a few years. The rate of technology transfer from track to street in electrical cars is much quicker than with Internal Combustion Engine cars, where the technology only ever completes up in high end sports cars to begin with, and then trickles down to the rest. In my view Formula E and electrical racing in general (the Tesla racing series will begin soon) is the future of motorsport. And that is because electrical vehicles are indeed the future of mobility.

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