Formula E is a racing series where all the cars are electric. They race in cities, and it helps show how electric cars can be used in sports.
Car
Nissan E405
The Nissan E405 is a type of race car that runs on electricity, competing in a series called Formula E. This series features races in cities, showcasing electric vehicles.
The Nissan Leaf is a popular electric car that runs on electricity instead of gasoline. It's known for being efficient and is one of the best-selling electric cars in the world.
Energy management is how drivers control the use of their car's power during a race. They need to decide when to go fast and when to save energy to make it to the finish line.
Steering wheel settings are the different adjustments drivers can make to how their car handles while racing. It helps them control the car better based on the track and their driving style.
A simulator is a computer program that lets drivers practice racing without being on a real track. It helps them learn how to handle the car and improve their skills.
Race engineers are the people who help drivers during races by giving them advice and analyzing how the car is performing. They work to make the car faster and help the driver succeed.
The battery in an electric car stores the energy needed to run the car. It's important for how far the car can go and how well it performs during a race.
Four wheel drive means that all four wheels of the car get power from the engine. This helps the car grip the road better, especially when accelerating or driving on slippery surfaces.
Torque is a way to measure how much force an engine can produce to make the car move. More torque means the car can speed up quickly and carry heavier things.
Runoff areas are parts of a racetrack where cars can go if they go off the track. They help keep drivers safe by giving them space to slow down without hitting walls.
Qualifying is when drivers try to get the fastest lap times before the race starts. The better your lap time, the closer you start to the front of the race, which can help you win.
Tires are the rubber parts that touch the road, and they help cars grip the surface. Different tires are used for different racing conditions to help the car perform better.
A hybrid engine is a type of engine that uses both gasoline and electricity to power a car. This helps the car use less fuel and produce fewer emissions.
Driver technology includes tools and systems that help drivers perform better in their cars. This can be things like data analysis that shows them how to improve their driving skills.
The 24 Hours of Le Mans is a famous car race where teams drive for a full day and night. It's a test of how fast and reliable the cars are.
LIVE
Are you one of the 1.5 million UK customers that have used MedExpress for your healthcare journey?
If not, accessing treatments for sexual health is now easier than ever.
You don't need to visit your GP or pharmacy. Just complete a short online consultation to
find the right treatment for you. We'll send your treatment directly to your door,
delivered to you in discrete packaging with ongoing support from our experienced
medical team. Take the first step towards managing your health concerns with confidence.
Visit medexpress.co.uk to learn more.
All that matters is that you care about them. GoFundMe is the trusted place to fundraise for
what you care about. With no pressure to hit your fundraising goal, but tons of tools to help you
reach it, you can confidently start fundraising right now. Whether it's creative, local, or
critical, your cause matters. There's a reason why GoFundMe is backed by millions and chosen
by fundraisers everywhere. It works and it matters. GoFundMe helps you make a real difference.
Start your GoFundMe today at GoFundMe.com. That's GoFundMe.com, G-O-F-U-N-D-M-E.com.
This is a commercial message brought to you by GoFundMe.
We're with Maria de Juana, who is the head of communications for Nissan Formula E team and
Jose Carlos from Miami here. So we're going to talk to your two pilots. Tell us who they are
and why they drive different numbers. What is number one and why is number 23? Tell us what is that?
So you're going to talk to our two drivers. We have Oliver Roland, the driver of the Nissan E405
and you have Norman Nato, who is the driver of the Nissan E405 number 23. Oliver is the
current world champion and as such he's driving the current number one because only the world
champion gets the honor of driving the current number one. He's British and has been actually
with Nissan for a long time. He actually started in Formula E as a rookie with Nissan and now he's
champion with Nissan. Norman, he's French, he's driving the number 23 for Nissan and he's a big
responsibility because the number 23 is very important for Nissan. We always compete with
the number 23 in our lineup because in Japanese, two is knee, three is sun, so two three is Nissan
and Norman is the driver of the 23. So did you know that? Yeah, in fact you have it all around the
leaf. Oh really? Two bars and three bars is all around the design of the leaf because of that. Oh my
god, I learned something else. Because of the meaning of two and three in Japanese that pronouns
like Nissan. That's correct. Let's talk to the drivers now, thank you. In a far away guys,
they're here for you, so if you have any questions, I want to start. So a lot of their fans,
regular fans watch obviously Formula One and they say, oh Formula E is not easy, but like I
learned like you have like so much to do within the race. Can you explain a little bit? Here we
have an awful lot to manage you. It goes from energy management, tires, overtaking, you know,
some races I think have like 300 overtakes per race. Yeah granted, it's not all like super
competitive overtaking. A lot of it is like, I like to describe it like a cycling race, you know,
like the peloton where we kind of swap around to save energy and then at some point becomes like
the go moment. But yeah, many many things to manage and I think I always say to people,
watch the race and see if you enjoy it before you make too many conclusions. What about the steering
wheel? It's like over 600 possibilities, combinations you have to do there? Yes, obviously there's
quite a lot on steering wheel we can do. If for us we're not playing with 600 different settings
during the race, obviously we are preparing quite a lot in the simulator to practice as much as we
can in terms of procedure with the steering wheel, communication with the race engineers, but yeah,
it's plenty of things we can do with the steering wheel which can bring performance. Or like in
the other end, like if it's not well stated, you can get penalized or lose performance out of it. So
it's a lot of things actually in Formula E you have to manage as a driver but also for the team.
So that's why like it's quite exciting. It's not only driving a car, it's many things you have to
think about and play with at the same time and trying to be fast. So yeah, that's why the simulator
preparation is very important. Since you guys come out with like 60% of the battery, do you think
you're driving this more difficult than Formula 1? Do you have to focus more than these guys to be
finished? I don't really want to say more difficult or less difficult. I think there's some aspects
of this race in the togetherness of the cars and the management that we have as drivers and
let's say less help from the pit wall than what they have in Formula 1 makes it more challenging
in some aspects. But then on the other side, you know Formula 1 has a lot of aerodynamics,
a lot of downforce and other things to manage. So I think they're like completely different
challenges but both have some bits that are more tricky and some bits that are less.
Congratulations for the victory in Mexico by the way. It was a great race. Tell me,
I don't know how long have you been racing Formula B but I'm interested to understand how the vehicles
evolve in this time that you have been around and this you're presenting or they are presenting a
new generation next month or so. I mean I've been here seven years now. It's true when I first
came over, I came from Formula 2 and tested in Formula 1 so the performance of the cars was
not even close. At top speed we were looking 220, 230 when I first arrived with significantly less
technology on software and things like that. Now we're at a place where around 0-100 is 1.8
seconds. Our top speed is close to 300 on some tracks so the cars have increased in performance
significantly over the seven years that I've been here. It was only seven years ago that they
were swapping cars in the races because they couldn't do a long race and now we have almost up to one
hour in terms of race time in some circuits. So the technology has moved on a lot and then
already describing that if you look to next year's car this thing is a real beast. It's going
to put us on the map, the grip, the aerodynamics, the power. It's going to be a proper, proper bit
of kit. You already told us that you don't want to compare but in acceleration you are not that
far from a Formula 1. And now 0-100 is better than them because we have four wheel drive.
What about you? What's your experience prior experience and how long in Formula 1 and
what changes have you seen? It's my official in Formula 1. Obviously like I'm driving in WEC as
well which is a different championship. I've never driven F1 cars so I can't really compare the
speed or anything like that but yeah we both drove in F2 in the past and honestly like I already
just said like the evolution of Formula E is very fast. Driving this car honestly now is especially
when you go in terms of torque, when you go on throttle like with the four wheel drive it's really,
really powerful and it's a completely different way of racing compared to the other championships
so that's why I would say that the fans are quite also excited to watch Formula E race because
there's a lot of overtaking, a lot of strategy behind it so it's something you cannot really
compare with the other championship because at the end everything is kind of different but
it's moving forward really quickly. So we just did the walk of the track behind you, I don't know
if you suppose behind you. That was quite interesting because you learned that this is a new track for
for this series and how do you like the track from what you've seen?
I would say that for us it's quite a basic track, it's very smooth, quite wide, plenty of runoff,
you know some of the tracks that we race on are very narrow, very bumpy so it's less challenging on
that aspect for us. It's quite a short lap but it's got some pretty challenging corners like turn
11 onto the back straight, obviously got the first three corners of the Formula 1 layout
but I think the biggest challenge here will come in the race, you're going to see a
completely crazy race. In the beginning I think it's going to be extremely slow
with kind of lots of shifting of the cars around the pack and then at some point it's
just going to explode into life so yeah I would say definitely watch out for the second half of the
race. What did you like about the track or how do you like the track? I like the atmosphere being
in Miami, being in the US it's always a place I love racing. I don't really know like as you
just say it's a new track for everyone so in terms of strategy it's going to be quite open,
it's going to be a lot of movements in the pack as I already just said and in qualifying I think it
will be really really tight in terms of lap time, it's quite a short track, it's going to be around
57 seconds, 56 maybe so yeah it would be really difficult to put it up in qualifying and be at
front because a small mistake can put you really far back because it's going to be so tight.
And in your experience as a rider, your hair changes a lot when you drive, it is a pretty heavy
vehicle because of your body and how do you deal with the tires? It's a special tire right?
No it's well special yes it's different at the end special you know every even in F1 you can hear
like they have a point of view on the tires you go too early it's different every series at the end
like we basically like at the beginning of the season like trying many things in terms of tires
like when we speak about tire window temperature that's what basically brings us the performance
so we know that the best of the tire works from this number to this highest number so you're always
trying to stay in this window and track to track this number can change because of the
thermal, because of the temperature, because if it's a faster track or slower track and so
at the end like first it's more like you're about to manage this temperature which is the most
important but the tire like yeah honestly it's in Canada sleek not the sleek tires the most
important is to put the tire in the temperature window at the end
we're already trying to prepare the rest strategy if it rains because obviously it's
going to change the strategy the setup of the car attack mode situation what we should do when we
take it yes you basically try to anticipate everything that might happen yeah to be prepared
as much as possible even though like most of the time you have to I would say freestyle a little
bit and and be very reactive to what's happening live because you cannot predict everything we
are also using a lot the simulator before every race is to reproduce or anticipate this kind of
things in terms of setup energy management so we do two or three days at the workshop before
every races to basically come to Miami virtually and try different things on the car setup energy
management tires preparation this kind of thing so um a general question about electric cars a lot
of people again decide the comparisons to Formula One and Formula E but I said in general electric
cars are pretty cool right I mean like they say like it might be faster and like it's more
experience more difficult to manage in the race but in general what do you think I wouldn't you
say to people who are kind of against regular consumer electric cars and Formula E how do you
convince them to like this is to be to to be fair like my job is to develop this technology
not convince the people in a way that we are all like different but if you win you convince them
by winning not really because at the end is not because this football team is winning that I'm
going to support them I'm if I'm a supporting this team yeah that's what I mean so at the end like
you know we are here my job is to win races to help Nissan to develop this technology
and obviously to promote it but I can't like really like go to someone and say no no
at the end like everyone is free to do what he wants to do like some people are against
electric cars some people are not I have the chance to do two different things as I say I'm
doing work which is different technology I'm doing Formula E which is fully electric so I'm really
happy basically to promote a bit of everything in a way that yeah there is not one single technology
today otherwise it will be clear for everyone yeah I think we are in the transition basically where
electric cars might be the future but they still the present right now where
where I would say in between clearly with Formula E we're showing that electric car
huge potential and it's moving forward very quickly but at the end I don't want to be the guy
saying no of course not of course not I'm always honest like if I won't like electric I won't be
racing in this championship today and as you said like at home I have I have the chance to have
different cars so I have electric and and hybrid engine for example as a driver how this experience
that is much more complete and the simulator everything that you have to learn about the
technology makes you better in your other cars yeah that's a good point it's honestly like
driving in Formula E because it's so complex and so much in details in this new it's a new technology
at the end like all the software that you are doing is something we did have like six seven eight
years ago so it's something which is really interesting for driver technology wise and also
that you could apply on different kind of technology and cars so that's why like for me it's really
interesting to do different championship because I can learn from all of them and try to use my
experience in different championship to basically put everything together and make the best car but
including the best potential is there a certain technology that you've seen really advanced
rapidly in the last few years in doing this any certain tactics yes yes yeah to be fair like as
I said like Formula E like it's a it's quite a new championship at the end so as Oliver said like
from where it started where you have to change car and do a driver change car like during the race
and right now what we can do like almost an hour like easy it's a it's a big step forward
and you know also like driving the cars you feel the difference honestly now like an
in-four-wheel drive 350 kilowatts I can't tell you inside of the car it's powerful as I said like
when I drive to 24 hours of Le Mans we take 340 kph in the straight line but in terms of torque
acceleration it's less impressive than a Formula E car so obviously a Formula E car today is going
a bit slow in terms of top speed but in terms of car in terms of torque sorry when you go in total
it's really powerful so that's why I don't like to compare technology because at the end yeah Formula
E has a lot of torque less top speed but all of them are really impressive at the end and the
technology is honestly like going forward like massively and this Gen 4 is a good example as
well of what's gonna come next so what's cooler to drive the number one car or that 23 car to
use that Nissan not much different one because you're the champion obviously I mean 23 is not my
number so I think one is nicer from my perspective what is the number if you put your one actually
44 oh like Lewis yeah before Lewis got to Formula one I was a bit of a when he was in go-kart him
okay I was following him a lot from his videos and stuff and I decided to take the same number
it's also videos of you yeah because nice well thank you guys very interesting and good luck
it's only the third race of the season so how many more to go 14 more a lot well good luck thank you
that's it for today's ai auto podcast with Javier Moda hope you enjoyed the ride as much as we did
tune in next time for more on how ai steering the wheel of tomorrow's autos drive safe stay curious
and catch you later
About this episode
Insights into the world of Formula E are shared by Nissan's communications head and two drivers, Oliver Rowland and Norman Nato. The episode dives into the significance of their car numbers, the complexities of racing in Formula E, and the evolution of the sport over the years. Listeners will learn about energy management, the intricacies of the steering wheel controls, and the upcoming advancements in vehicle technology. The drivers also discuss their experiences on the new Miami track and the unique challenges of electric racing compared to Formula 1.
From the paddock at the 2026 Miami E-Prix, we sit down with Nissan Formula E drivers Oliver Rowland and Norman Nato. The conversation covers the unique demands of Formula E racing and the origins of Nissan’s legendary No. 23, a number deeply rooted in the brand’s motorsports identity.
Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
