The annual debate over which drivers will miss which race when Formula E and the World Endurance Championship clash appears to becoming more straightforward this time around.
Stoffel Vandoorne, Jean-Eric Vergne, Nyck de Vries, Sebastien Buemi, Robin Frijns and Norman Nato will all face clashes when Formula E races at Berlin Tempelhof on the same July weekend that the WEC races at Interlagos.
But only two of them look set to skip the Formula E event.
With the Berlin fixture being the penultimate event of the season before the closing London E-Prix double-header, championship positions will be more hotly contested for drivers in Formula E at that stage so it's the WEC teams that this year are trying to compensate more.
Nissan driver Nato will miss the Berlin races as his priority contract is with the new Cadillac/Jota alliance in the WEC. He is highly likely to be replaced by recently confirmed Nissan reserve Sergio Sette Camara.
But Vandoorne and Vergne are set to be at Berlin again as their WEC employer Peugeot is likely to condense its line-ups to two drivers per hypercar, as it did for the 2024 clash.
Last year Envision had to bring in a completely new Formula E line-up for the clash because both Frijns and Buemi were racing in the WEC. This time, that won't be the case.
The Race can reveal that Frijns will miss the Interlagos WEC race as he has come to an agreement with Envision that the Formula E event will take priority over his BMW sportscar commitments.
Envision managing director Sylvain Filippi told The Race that "it's sorted with Robin completely" and that discussions with Buemi had indicated the timing of this year's clash meant Formula E could take priority for him too over his Toyota WEC commitments.
"The issue [in 2024] was with the races before Le Mans," Filippi added.
This alludes to Buemi's contract which is believed to put more emphasis on races prior to the Le Mans 24 Hours in June, which would tally with why he had to prioritise the Spa WEC event last May over the Berlin races (where he was replaced by Formula 2 race winner Paul Aron).
Asked what would happen if Buemi is leading the WEC standings after Le Mans, Filippi said "we then have another discussion. I'm working on the understanding we have that as it's after Le Mans, it's no problem".
"You have to remember, for the manufacturer, it makes no difference," Filippi added.
"They still win it. It's only for the driver [that missing a WEC race matters]."
Buemi could be challenging for a record fifth WEC title in 2025 and, while he has a competitive package in Formula E, the present season is the third and final campaign of his Envision contract.
Although Filippi refused to go into detail regarding the specifics of Buemi's contract with Toyota, it is widely presumed that the driver has an element of choice post-Le Mans when it comes to where he races.
His Toyota WEC team-mate De Vries's status is publicly unknown but The Race understands that he is likely to be racing in the Brazil WEC event - meaning that he will have to be replaced at Mahindra, as he was in 2024.
On that occasion Mahindra chose reserve driver Jordan King, who took 12th- and 18th-place finishes on his Formula E debut proper. King is also the reserve for 2025 but the team is known to be looking at alternatives for this July.
De Vries's Mahindra team-mate Edoardo Mortara, who raced at Berlin last year despite also being contracted to Lamborghini, will not face the same dilemma in 2025 after Lamborghini withdrew its hypercar entry from the WEC this season.
Other drivers that will be occasionally driving in endurance this season include Porsche pair Antonio Felix da Costa and Pascal Wehrlein. They will both partake in the IMSA SportsCar Championship's Daytona 24 Hours later this month - da Costa in LMP2 and Wehrlein in a privateer Porsche hypercar - and could also make appearances at Le Mans in June.
Andretti's Nico Mueller is also believed to still harbour ambitions to race sportscars as part of his new factory Porsche deal.
