By Alan Baldwin
LONDON, Nov 6 (Reuters) – Australian mining billionaire Andrew Forrest said Formula One belonged in a museum and challenged the combustion-engined series to a duel at the launch on Friday of his new all-electric Fortescue Zero Racing Formula E team.
The Fortescue founder and executive chairman said he would like to see their respective cars go head-to-head.
“I think Formula One has a place,” he told reporters.
“It should have a very large building with Formula One at the front of it, made out of limestone, with lights on it, and it should be a museum because the younger generation are going to go to the highest performance, greatest technically advanced and kindest to the environment racing there is, and that’s going to be Formula E.
“Formula One are fantastic but their time is ticking past them.”
NEW GEN4 CAR SET TO BE UNLEASHED
Formula E, which has a far smaller global television audience than Formula One, says the new Gen4 car for the 2026/27 season will reach 100kph in about 1.8 seconds and 200kph in 4.2, some 30% faster than a Formula One car.
Both series share a common bond through US billionaire John Malone, founder of Formula One owners Liberty Media and Formula E owners Liberty Global.
Fortescue Zero Racing is the first Australian-owned Formula E team and was formed after the purchase of Penske Autosport last September.
Their Gen4 car will have a powertrain supplied by champions Jaguar with British drivers Dan Ticktum and Taylor Barnard.
The company, which acquired Williams Advanced Engineering in 2022 from former Formula One world champions Williams, was involved in Formula E before that as a supplier of battery technology.
The Williams connection remains strong, with former marketing head Jim Wright now team principal and Claire Williams, who ran the team founded by her father Frank, an ambassador for Fortescue.
The FW initials appear on the new Fortescue car, with Wright and Claire Williams paying tribute also to Australia and Williams’ late 1980 F1 world champion Alan Jones, who died on Thursday.
But despite the several Formula One links Forrest, who also described Frank Williams as a mentor, was forthright on that championship.
“I want to see Formula One go head to head with Formula E,” he declared during the stage presentation. “And then I want to say ‘how many decades did they have to get this right, and how many months did we have to get it right’. And let’s see how we go.
“Let’s just put it to the test. I don’t care if we come first or second. What I know is that we’re doing in months and years what they (Formula One) have taken decades and if we come anywhere near, it’s over.
“Rise to the challenge, meet the dream. Formula One head-to-head with Formula E. Let’s try it on, baby.”
The Formula One championship started in 1950 while Formula E’s first season was in 2014, when the drivers needed to switch cars mid-race to have enough battery to do a full race distance.
Formula One cars now use fully sustainable fuel and the sport last year recorded a 35% reduction in its carbon footprint compared to the 2018 baseline. It says it remains on track to fulfil its commitment to become net-zero carbon by 2030.
(Reporting by Alan Baldwin, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
