Nick Cassidy has made almost a perfect start to life as a Jaguar TCS Racing driver, something he’s “quite relieved” about as he ended Season 9 with a “high amount of confidence”.
Cassidy has settled into the factory Jaguar team quicker than anyone could’ve predicted, with him already delivering consistent results. He’s featured on the podium in all three races in Season 10, whilst his second podium last weekend in Diriyah came in the form of victory.
The Kiwi started the second race of the Diriyah E-Prix in P3 but soon found himself in the lead, after Oliver Rowland and Robin Frijns activated their first Attack Mode. When Cassidy got into the lead, he pushed “so hard” to build a gap, allowing him to activate his Attack Modes and remain in the lead.
He did this to perfection to secure his first win of 2024 and the sixth of his Formula E career. Unsurprisingly, given that he’s yet to finish off the podium, Cassidy leads the Drivers’ Championship by 19 points over Pascal Wehrlein. Cassidy admitted after his win that he could’ve never imagined that he’d make such a strong start at Jaguar.
“Not at all,” Cassidy told Motorsport Week after his victory. “I think I’ve probably come into this year as the most motivated guy after the way last year finished. But I also, the last three races of last year, I started in the front row and I probably went into the off-season with a huge amount of confidence, and I’m quite relieved that I’ve been able to kind of pick up in a similar way with the change of team.”
Mostly thanks to Cassidy’s three podiums to kickstart 20234, Jaguar have a healthy 31-point lead in the Teams’ Championship. The Coventry-based side is currently on a real high, resulting in a “really nice atmosphere” in the garage.
However, Cassidy is expecting that atmosphere to change at some point this season, as he believes “four manufacturers” are capable of winning races. Whilst he didn’t name them, they are Jaguar, Porsche, Stellantis and Nissan. With each manufacturer having a customer team, Cassidy pointed out that it means 16 drivers are capable of winning.
Because of this, he’s wary that “the smallest” mistake will have huge consequences, with Formula E being a series where “anything can happen”. He used Jake Dennis as an example, as the reigning World Champion won the first race in Diriyah but finished 12th in the second.
“Look, we’re all smiling because the results are good,” Cassidy said. “So it’s just a really nice atmosphere at the moment. It’s going to change. Like this field is so close, man.
“Honestly, it’s not really talked about enough. But without talking anyone down, I think that there’s four manufacturers right now that can easily win races and that’s 16 drivers, which to then consistently be up there makes it so hard and it just takes the smallest thing to go wrong.
“You look at Jake today, he dominated yesterday by 13 seconds and I don’t know where he finished today. So it shows that anything can happen. That could be me next race, and we’ve just got to keep pushing.”
A key feature of last Saturday’s race was that it was a lap shorter than last Friday’s. This was criticised by the drivers ahead of the event, as they were concerned that the race would just be flat out, making overtaking impossible. However, Cassidy revealed that it was “super tough” and not as simple as most had expected.
It was much harder for the Kiwi as he pushed so hard in the opening laps to build a lead, whilst others managed their energy more carefully so that they could go faster in the closing laps.
“No, super tough. Super tough to manage,” Cassidy admitted, before explaining why it was so challenging. “Well, it was just because I went so hard and I just then had no energy and so when I heard that Rowland and these other guys would come in pretty quickly, and I saw the mirror, and I was like, wow, they’re coming fast.
“I was like, okay, maybe I’ve gone too much here, but luckily it worked out.”
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