Nick Heidfeld has been retained by the Mahindra Racing team for the 2018/19 FIA Formula E Championship as its reserve driver, FormulaRapida.net can reveal.
The former Formula 1 racer joined Mahindra in 2015/16 season after a year with Venturi. He has competed for the Indian outfit for the last three seasons, scoring seven podiums – albeit all of them third place finishes.
For the 2018/19 season, Heidfeld will remain with the Mahindra team but in a new role of its official reserve driver. The German racer last month was named as the vehicle development consultant & brand ambassador for Automobili Pininfarina.
He is working with the company to produce the most powerful Italian Hypercar ever. Pininfarina is an Italian car design and coachbuilder firm which was acquired by Mahindra in the year 2015.
With the news of Heidfeld being named as its reserve and Felix Rosenqvist moving to IndyCar, it means Mahindra will have an all-new driver line-up for the 2018/19 season with Belgian Jerome D’Ambrosio a certain name reported as one of its signing.
D’Ambrosio raced with Dragon Racing since the inaugural season but the team announced Jose Maria Lopez as its first signing. The entry list for the 2018/19 pre-season test suggests Maximilian Gunther and Antonio Fuoco as the likely drivers to partner Lopez.
Meanwhile, the other seat at Mahindra is speculated to be taken up by another former F1 driver Pascal Wehrlein. The German raced in F1 for Manor and Sauber until the 2017 season after which he was forced to return to DTM in 2018.
With Mercedes leaving the championship, Wehrlein decided to leave the German manufacturer’s academy as well in the lookout for a drive on his own. The Indian team is scheduled to announce its line-up on Day 1 of the pre-season test at Valencia on Tuesday.
https://twitter.com/MahindraRacing/status/1051828913784193024
