Stoffel Vandoorne: I’d rather be busy than bored
We speak to Maserati MSG Racing driver and former champion Stoffel Vandoorne about the sport’s evolution, racing in two series at the same time, and his prospects for the 2025 season
You’ve been racing in Formula E since 2019. After your final difficult season in Formula 1 with McLaren, what attracted you to Formula E?
Stoffel Vandoorne: There was a pretty quick transition from F1 to Formula E and there was a bit of a crossover, but what really excited me about it was the opportunity to join Mercedes in a new project at the time.
The first year was with HWA, which was eventually going to become the factory team for Mercedes. But that was a very interesting challenge and it was after conversations with Toto, he wanted me to be one of the first ones to join the project and be there from the start.
So that was very exciting. And a fresh opportunity for me after a bit of a tough time in Formula 1 to establish myself again and to find the roadmap again to winning ways.
That was the main thing for me at the time – to find a competitive seat somewhere where I knew I had an opportunity to win races and fight for championships.
Do you feel like you’ve found a happy home in Formula E?
Stoffel Vandoorne: I definitely do. I like the championship a lot. For me, it’s one of the most competitive ones and I think a lot of people underestimate the challenge of Formula E. The level that the teams are now at is Formula 1 standards.
We’re not producing our own cars but each manufacturer is producing their own powertrains, and the level of engineering is extremely high. I think it’s almost, a more exciting championship performance for engineers, because there’s just so much freedom and so much software involved in the cars that makes it very interesting. And it’s very satisfying when you do well, because it’s really a combination of driver and team that get success.
It’s not just that you need the best car. It’s how you manage your weekends. They’re very dynamic, with very little time on track and very little time to prepare. It’s how you build up your weekend that gives you success. And it’s a very rewarding feeling when you when you manage that.
You’re one of just 10 Formula E champions. Where does winning that title rank for you?
Stoffel Vandoorne: I would say it’s probably one of my best achievements because it ranks as a world championship and there’s not many opportunities in a career to win world championships
Obviously I won a lot of other championships before and some of those were very important to me, but it was on the junior ladder, the ones in GP2 and Formula Renault.
They were critical moments in my career to progress and to make it as a professional racing driver. But in Formula E, you’re going up against other champions, all the drivers that are there they’ve won a lot of championships in the past.
We all have very similar CVs in terms of what we’ve won, what we’ve competed in before. So to come out on top of that has a bit of a more special feeling.
In terms of operations, how different is Maserati from Mercedes EQ?
Stoffel Vandoorne: It’s a bit different, but it’s also similar in a sense because the teams have worked together back in the past and back when Susie [Wolff] was there when Jerome was there, we had a very close working relationship between Venturi – that is now Maserati – and Mercedes. So both teams were working together quite a lot. Mercedes was a factory team, so that has some positives and negatives and, sometimes you have to manage other stuff that privateer teams don’t really have to do.
But it was a good relationship and I feel like even though the team is with Stellantis powertrains right now, some of the work ethics and procedures have or are still being kept in place from the Mercedes days.
Also, all the teams in Formula E are progressing. People move teams, and, we’re 10 years into Formula E right now. That means that all the teams are very well up to speed with what they need to do, what they need to implement to extract the maximum performance. Slowly all the teams are converging towards the same things.
How different is the Gen 3 Evo car to the to your title winning Gen 2 car?
Stoffel Vandoorne: It’s very different. The concept of Gen 3 and now the Gen 3 Evo has changed a lot. I would say one of the big changes is tyres. They used to be Michelin back in the day. They’re now Hankook. They have a completely different operating window way of working compared to the Michelin, even in terms of driving style. It’s quite different how you have to drive the tyres and how you have to manage them.
And then, this year it’s really the four-wheel drive that is standing out for us. It’s a massive change in performance. Big change on acceleration, on potential that we have out of the corners. It’s really changed a lot in the dynamic of the races. Attack mode back in the day didn’t really have a big impact whilst now with the four-wheel drive, we have a massive step in performance. And you can make up a lot of a lot of positions. So it’s really changed the dynamic of the races.
As well as your Formula E programme this year you’ll be making a full time return to the World Endurance Championship with Peugeot. What are the differences in how the electricity is managed with the hybrid 9X8, and your Formula E car?
Stoffel Vandoorne: I would say the endurance car is much more like a normal race car. There’s not the whole concept of energy management. It’s more F1 style where you manage a bit of fuel, you manage the tyres, and it’s about pure pace and strategy over a long endurance race.
Formula E is very different. It’s sprint races. Qualifying is very important, but the race management is really the big topic there. There’s a lot of preparation that we do before events just in a simulator to prepare our systems on the car.
These cars are very complex in terms of the systems that we have to manage the energy. And, even driving styles, there’s a lot of little techniques, little tricks that you can do to improve little things. And yeah, we’re all looking at the last hundredths and thousandths of energy that we can gain.
So it’s a complete different dynamic, but I love that I have access to both and that I can compete in both championships. They’re, both completely different in their own way.
I love Formula E because you have your own car. It’s a single seater. And you you work for yourself. Whilst in endurance racing, you share the car. And it’s a different concept of the race.
How much mental bandwidth does it take up manage a totally differential racing programme?
Stoffel Vandoorne: It’s challenging. That’s for sure. This is the easy period of the year now, but soon the busy period of the year is going to start. April, May, June are challenging because that’s where there’s a big concentration of Formula E races and a big concentration of WEC races.
So there’s a challenging part in terms of schedules, calendars and even just mentally to unwind after races is hard because one week you have a formula E race, the next weekend you’re doing a WEC race, then the weekend after that, you’re back into a Formula E race.
And there’s not just the race weekends, there’s all the preparation we do in between the races as well. That’s what makes it a bit complicated, but at the end of the day I’m not complaining to be busy. I’d rather be busy than sitting at home.
So what is it you enjoy about electrified motorsport?
Stoffel Vandoorne: The racing is the main part. It’s super close. All the cars are pretty close together and you have opportunities out there in the races.
I think we all enjoy close racing. Sometimes we’re having to touch each other a little bit as well. But rubbing is racing, right? And it’s just very rewarding when have a good result.
You’re 12th in the standings with seven points after two races. Are you happy with things so far? And do you think that you’ll be able to climb on top of the podium by the season ender in London?
Stoffel Vandoorne: So far, it’s been a decent start to the season.
We definitely have some work to do. We’re probably not on the level where Porsche is right now. They seem after those first two races, to be the standout performers,. They look quite hard to beat. But then it’s quite close between all the others.
And we know we need to make a step forward on the efficiency side, I think that’s where we’re still lacking, a bit compared to the Porsches especially. And then there is understanding the tyre. We’ve not necessarily maximized our potential in qualifying, which means we’ve been starting a little bit further back than we wanted to and having to work our way through the field.
That’s one of our priorities – to get on top of that to qualify at the front and then we can race there as well.
With the way the races are going, I think podiums are definitely possible. Hopefully we can have a few this season.
