Driver of This Decade? Formula E, Santiago 2019-20

Stuart Garlick

Maximilian Günther, who won the Santiago E-Prix on 18 January 2020 (photo: copyright and under licence FIA Formula E)

There was something comforting and familiar about seeing Maximilian Günther on top of the podium in Santiago. It wasn’t that we had seen this precise occurrence before - it was the German driver’s first Formula E victory, after a hard-fought battle with Antonio Felix da Costa and Mitch Evans - it was something deeper in the memory banks.

Whatever the case, Günther will almost certainly have plenty more chances to flash that 250-kilowatt smile. It seemed appropriate to begin the 2020s the way the decade might well continue.

It felt like seeing a young Sebastian Vettel, enjoying the plaudits at the Italian F1 Grand Prix in 2008, taking the first win for a Red Bull-run car. At the time it was proclaimed, rightly, as the start of something extraordinary. We should enjoy this time, because, as we know from Vettel, the easy charm, the grins as victories are racked up, can eventually lead to the same man, a few years later, carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. If this is an era, let’s enjoy it while it’s here.

Somehow, this transformation of Günther from mildly introverted newcomer with talent, to a driver capable of taking a race at the top level by the scruff of the neck, seems to have happened at lightning speed, with the result that the youngest driver on the grid at 22 must now be factored in as a serious title contender.

It seems frivolous to mention that word got around the paddock and world-feed commentary box that he didn’t like the regularly used nickname ‘Maxi’, but, whether this memo came from the driver or those close to him, it appeared part of a coded message that, this time, we should take Günther seriously, on his own terms. Last year, in an on-off season with Dragon, Günther was the one to watch in the future. He hasn’t taken much time to arrive.

That season taught Günther a few hard lessons. moved in and out and then back into his seat with the team, there were moments that showed how outstanding he was - his driving style working perfectly in the heavy, yet skittish, Formula E car - and yet there were erratic moments, and a few too many skirmishes in what, looking back, was a season laden with crashes for most of the field, as even the most experienced drivers got used to the Gen2 chassis and the additional power available on the same, compact, tracks.

Günther celebrates after the race (photo: copyright and under licence FIA Formula E)

BMW i Andretti, like Günther, seem to have learned from past mishaps. Having been fastest in testing for two seasons in a row, then taking a win in the opening race meeting in both seasons of their collaboration, there were question marks over their ability to keep on landing the punches through the later rounds. Andretti, prior to the BMW tie-in, had never had the expectations associated with being a frontrunning team, and Antonio Felix da Costa arguably missed out on being in serious title contention thanks to a misinterpretation of team-mate Alexander Sims’ intentions as they were alongside each other in Marrakesh, a race the Portuguese could, and should, have won easily.

The US-German collaboration seems more polished this time around, and its strategists got the most important calls right on Saturday. Mitch Evans had opted to use all his Attack Mode allocations early in the race, pulling out a sizeable lead in the opening laps. This was agreed with the Jaguar pit, concerned that the baking heat in Santiago would lead to battery overheating and so an inability to take advantage of extra power in the latter stages. Pascal Wehrlein made it past Günther in a great move at the start of the race, and the Mahindra driver seemed the closest challenger to polesitter and leader Evans initially.

Wehrlein was to drop back with cooling issues, eventually finishing fourth behind Evans, who had to manage his usable energy in the latter stages of the race. Amid considerable contact in the midfield, Jean-Eric Vergne had made his way quietly into fourth with 20 minutes to go. Behind him was his team-mate da Costa, and it was to be the battle between the two Techeetah drivers which arguably decided the race. 

Antonio Felix da Costa (behind) challenges Jean-Eric Vergne (photo: copyright and under licence FIA Formula E)

Vergne slowed, and seemed to make a turning motion into one of the walls covering the side of the Parque O’Higgins Circuit, in an attempt to remove a rubbing left-front wheelarch. While he did this, da Costa sized up a move, but found the double champion blocking the inside of the hairpin, the two of them almost at a standstill. Had Vergne been playing the team game, while he waited for his bodywork to fly off, he could have let da Costa through, but by doing the opposite, it was a signal that he would give no quarter to his new colleague, and perhaps an earlier-than-expected unravelling of their relationship.

The lost time, and the lost usable energy, from that exchange, plus the hot battery from following Vergne those few corners more than he needed to, may have been a deciding factor in the result. With Evans and Wehrlein managing their own races further back, the final battle for the lead was between Günther and the driver he replaced. Da Costa made it past at the Turn 10 hairpin, with a harsh nudge described by E-Talking podcast co-host Conrad O’Keefe on Twitter as a “Forza Motorsport 2 yeet-athon”.

It was Günther, though, who had the final say, making it into a lead he did not surrender, on the back straight on the final lap, da Costa being almost out of usable energy and having to coast earlier. Da Costa complained after the race of being “fed the wrong information from the pit,” and of not being told to slow down until after he had pushed for the lead. “I feel like we lost this one,” he said. 

Mitch Evans was unhappy with race strategy (photo: copyright and under licence FIA Formula E)

Da Costa, and Evans, who said similar in his post-race interview, would be forgiven for wondering what more they could have done with sharper team strategy and more cooperation from others, but there was one very happy, and popular, winner up there.

The Gen1 era, as it is known retrospectively, was a battle between Sebastien Buemi and Lucas di Grassi, with Vergne getting the best out of the car in its final season. The Gen2 era, so far, belongs to Vergne. Could Günther eclipse all these names eventually? Formula E is not given to domination - its qualifying format, and the frenetic nature of races, see to that. Still, we might just be seeing a man for the 2020s rise to prominence.

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