until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League
Oliver Rowland is ready to renew his Formula E career after what he described, in his first interview since standing down from his Mahindra seat, as a “tough” season and a half with the team.
Rowland has kept a relatively low profile since after the Monaco E-Prix in early May when he and Mahindra mutually agreed to part ways.
The Race understands that Rowland is no longer formally contracted to Mahindra and has been free to pursue a 2024 seat, which he says he is optimistic of securing.
“Yes, I am confident I will be on the grid next season,” Rowland told The Race.
“Obviously, there’s a lot of movement in the market at the moment, from drivers and teams, with probably some surprises in terms of where people have decided to move to.
“It looked probably more stable earlier on in the year, but now there are all kinds of things changing.”
Rowland and his representative Steve Hewett are believed to have spoken to several teams in recent months, including Rowland’s former team Nissan, with which he won an E-Prix at Berlin Tempelhof in August 2020.
Deals are starting to formulate for 2024, with Nick Cassidy having put pen to paper for Jaguar recently and Rene Rast expected to be replaced by Sam Bird at McLaren.
Seats at Andretti, Nissan and Mahindra are current available with a pool of drivers of at least Rowland, axed AlphaTauri Formula 1 driver and 2021 Formula E champion Nyck de Vries, Norman Nato, Felipe Drugovich, Sergio Sette Camara, Lucas di Grassi and Maximilian Guenther believed to be in discussions for vacancies.
Rowland, who will attend an E-Prix for the first time since leaving Mahindra at the London season finale this weekend, also told The Race that a few months away from Formula E have been beneficial – describing it as a “necessary break”.
“When I started my Formula E career I had three very positive years and was always very positive,” he said.
“The season where we finished in second in the teams’ championship [with Nissan in 2019-20] was really strong and then even the season after that I really kicked on and got into the swing of things, even with a car that probably wasn’t capable of getting the results every weekend.
“Then obviously, moving to Mahindra I knew straight away that things were going to be difficult. I wasn’t blind to the fact that it wasn’t the best car on the grid, and I needed to work with the team and develop that car to become better and better.”
Rowland scored the vast majority of Mahindra’s points in 2022 and took a remarkable pole position for and runner-up finish in the penultimate race of the year in Seoul.
Shortly after that achievement Mahindra’s team principal Dilbagh Gill left the team and was replaced in December 2022 by former FIA director of Formula E and innovative sport projects, Frederic Bertrand.
The new Gen3 Mahindra has been the most uncompetitive of the manufacturer cars on the grid this season with only a tenacious third-place finish in the Mexico season opener by Lucas di Grassi being any kind of highlight for the team.
“I didn’t want to stop but it was tough. I mean tough from quite a lot of different aspects,” said Rowland.
“But at the same time, I think it’s probably done me good and it’s actually been quite nice to be able to watch the races live and also watch from different perspectives from different drivers and see how the races are developing.
“You kind of can read and learn a little bit. But when you’re watching it live from the outside and trying to read how people are playing the games at the moment it’s been pretty valuable, so it’s actually something that I have enjoyed.
“Obviously, I would prefer to be racing at the front but it’s been good for me to kind of reset from a difficult 18 months and spend a bit of time with family.
“But I am raring to get back in the cockpit because I’ve still got a lot to achieve in Formula E.”
