MotoE: Electric Motorsport's Two-Wheeled Future?
Photo courtesy of MotoE
With Formula E continuing to grow and evolve, it’s worth remembering that there are other forms of electric motorsport, at earlier stages, but providing exciting racing, and further proof that motorsport can be sustainable.
One of those series is MotoE. It’s a spec motorcycle championship which ran its first four-race season in 2019, supporting the MotoGP programme in Europe. It will be back in 2020. Inaugural champion Matteo Ferrari, plus British runner-up and six-season MotoGP veteran Bradley Smith return, while Alex de Angelis is another of a host of recognisable names due to line up on the grid. MotoE is administered by Dorna Sports, and its boss, Nicolas Goubert.
Goubert, who left Michelin in 2017 for his role at the race organiser, explained the reason for starting MotoE. It was “to be relevant to what you can see on the street,” he said. “Our objective is to organise motorbike races with relevant technology. We’re starting to see [increasing numbers of] electric bikes. We thought it was the right time to offer electric bike racing on top of everything else you can see on a [MotoGP] weekend.”
The early days, in 2019, were an incredibly difficult time for the whole MotoE championship, with the area where the bikes were being prepared catching fire at a test session, weeks before the planned first race, causing the series debut to be put back and causing the destruction of all bikes manufactured for the series to that point. For many championships it could have been curtains before it had began - but MotoE had the backing and the organisation to pick itself up and start again, and now finds itself in an immeasuably better place going into a new season.
“What we know is that there was no bike where the fire started,” recounted the man who was tasked with getting MotoE ready to race again. “So there were no bikes, but many, many wires, a lot of equipment, and a lot that could have gone wrong. Three years ago there was a fire in a Yamaha MotoGP box [pit garage] - but we were fortunate that was a concrete box, and the fire did not spread.” By contrast, the MotoE bikes shared a space, which made a blaze, which Goubert said was pure misfortune and was caused by an electrical short-circuit, far worse.
Afterwards, multiple additional safety measures were implemented to prevent a repeat. “From the next event, we separated the bikes on one side, and the electrical equipment on the other side. Each bike is in a box on its own, so if there is a problem, it won’t spread to the others. We also have a team of professional firefighters.”
“Before the fire, we talked to the FIM and told them we had to have firefighters every time right next to our EPark, we made sure the fire engine was right next to our tent. But… what was planned for the race, was not planned for the test. We were the only series testing, and the firefighters were 20 minutes away. Now, and the decision was made after that fire we have them all the time, at tests and races, and we have our own firefighters, so they know what to expect and how to react very quickly.”
MotoGP attracts a different crowd to car racing, but like many Formula One fans, MotoGP followers have come to expect the loud blare of a motorcycle engine. Seeing similar machinery, but powered by batteries, and making a sound not dissimilar to a Formula E car, was a difficult adjustment for some.
Close racing is guaranteed (photo courtesy of MotoE)
Goubert understood this, but felt it added to his determination to establish the championship. “We wanted to prove that watching an electric bike race could be as exciting as watching a normal bike race. People have been quite impressed with the show.” This has been in part because of races which may have been short (they last 15 minutes), but have provided ample wheel-to-wheel entertainment. “Honestly speaking, when you have new technology, you have to make sure there are exciting races.”
This is where the spec formula comes in. “One way to ensure close racing is to have everyone using comparable equipment. If we had been doing it a different way, leaving it free, telling people ‘come with your electric bike and we’ll have a race,’ it would not have worked.” In beginning with a spec formula, Goubert viewed there as being comparisons with Formula E. “Formula E started like that, then they opened it a little bit to bring in different carmakers. Even now, Formula E is not an open formula like Formula One is.”
This may be debatable, but what is beyond dispute is that the Nissan powertrain debate in 2019 showed Formula E teams are willing to compromise to ensure all competitors can race on something approaching a level playing field. “If you open it widely, you’ll have very different results. People will put a lot of money to finish first, and you will not have the show you have now.”
Still, the dream of most people following electric motorsport would be to have an electric motorcycle championship that was filled with as many manufacturers as is its four-wheeled equivalent. “Honestly speaking we are not there yet, we’ll see what happens in the future. If you look at the bike market, it’s quite often lagging behind the car market. We don’t see that many bike-makers running electric bikes. The big one is Harley Davidson, but the three or four big Japanese firms have not yet produced a sports bike with a battery and an electric engine [sic],” Goubert explained.
“We’re really pleased with Energetica, an Italian brand, who are doing a tremendous job,” he said of the manufacturer that supplies bikes to all of the grid. “Of course in three, four, five, six, seven years’ time, when we will have many bike-makers on the marketplace, we’ll see then.”
It was a question that lingered - why is it that electric bikes haven’t hit the mainstream? “I think it’s because of the costs. With the cars, there was Elon Musk, and I think people were scared of his success - plus, all the regulations come on meaning carmakers start working on electric cars. With bikes the market is a bit different. The cost of a bike is very different from the cost of a car, and batteries are still very expensive. Put a battery on a bike and it’s already a lot more than many people can afford. For mass-market guys like the Japanese, it’s difficult.”
The 2020 season brings short races but recognisable names (photo courtesy of MotoE)
The Frenchman had plenty of hope for the future. “I do think the price of batteries will go down, as they already are, and then it’ll become more possible for a bike-maker to make an affordable electric bike.”
There is another major difference between Formula E and MotoE, and one which will not change: the races’ relative locations. Formula E is likely to continue to be a series that heads to city centres, bringing racing to metropolitan crowds. MotoE cannot go in this direction, Goubert said.
“I was involved with Formula E right from the beginning [with tyre supplier Michelin], and I think it was a deliberate decision to go to city centres. It involved families and new kinds of fans, and of course the autonomy of an electric car is far less than that of a petrol car. But we would never, ever run a bike in a town. The safety measures needed in a crash mean we don’t want to do that. Safety first.”
He also expressed contentment with the exposure brought by the MotoGP package. “Because we are with MotoGP, we have all the media and TV, and of course it makes it easy to compare performance. We’re very happy we’re competitive with Moto3. I’ve used the word competitive in terms of laptime, but we’re not competitors.”
And that race length - only a quarter of an hour - was something Goubert was very happy to talk up as a virtue. “A lot of national championships run races at twenty minutes, so not far away from what we do. One very positive aspect is that there is only one strategy for riders - to be, from the first laps, pushing for the front, and that leads to very exciting races.” We’ll see for ourselves in 2020, but what’s clear is that electric motorsport has a future on two wheels, as well as four.