Porsche’s Florian Modlinger: “The break gave us a chance to make further progress”

As a result of the recent four week break ahead of this weekend’s inaugural São Paulo E-Prix, Constructors’ Championship leaders TAG Heuer Porsche Formula E Team have supposedly made “further progress”, with the Germans targeting a fourth victory of the season this weekend.

After several years of being Formula E’s sleeping giant, Porsche have certainly been the motorsport powerhouse that they are known to be so far this season, with the side having won three of the five completed races. The side sit comfortably at the top of the standings by a staggering forty-two points, thanks to having claimed three wins and a further two podiums. Pascal Wehrlein also sits top of the Drivers’ Championship heading into this weekend, with the German sitting eighteen-points clear at the top of the leaderboard.

Gen3 has certainly been kind to the Germans so far this season; however, after such an intense start to the 2022/23 ABB FIA Formula E World Championship, the four week break ahead of the sixth round of the season this weekend has given the team a chance to enjoy some “time off”. As well as enjoying some time away, Team Principal Florian Modlinger has revealed that the team has made “further progress” with their car since Cape Town, where António Félix da Costa claimed his first win for the team.

“After such a demanding start to the season with five races within six weeks in four different cities, some time to breathe was very welcome. But we’re still on a steep learning curve with our new car. The break gave us the chance to make further progress. Having time off is definitely necessary, too, because our competitors have also used that time to continue working on their packages.”

Porsche probably can’t believe quite how well they’ve started the Gen3 era, with pre-season testing having shown nothing special from the Stuttgart-based team. Whilst they have been very dominant, Porsche certainly have some areas to work on, with qualifying being the biggest of the lot. There is no doubt that Porsche have the best race car; however, Wehrlein and da Costa have both tended to struggle during qualifying, something which makes fighting through the field for victory that much harder.

Wehrlein discovered this in South Africa, after crashing into Sébastian Buemi on the opening lap, resulting in his first retirement of the season. Errors like that will need to be avoided in order for the team to claim both titles come the end of the season, with several teams beginning to make rapid progress. Modlinger recognises ahead of Brazil that the team do have areas to work on, but that ultimately, the side “can be proud” of how well they’ve done so far this campaign.

“Our team had a very successful start to the season. Three wins in five races – that’s something everyone in the team and in our development squad can be proud of. Our strengths so far this season have been the execution itself and the race performance. We’ve made fewer mistakes than the competition and have consistently called on our potential. We still have work to do in qualifying.

“We definitely have some reserves left there to tap into. If we were to start from the front, that would make things a lot easier for us. But we’ve gradually improved in recent weeks on that front, too.”