All drivers for the Formula E Rookie test next week have been named.
After a lot of the teams have announced their drivers, the FIA announced the complete list today.
Other than the drivers we have mentioned in previous articles, the likes of Pietro Fittipaldi, Michael Benyahia, Gary Paffett, Mitsunori Takaboshi, Alexander Albon, Daniel Juncadella, Paul di Resta, and Sam Dejonghe are on the list too.
It is very interesting to see three Mercedes works drivers among these names in the shape of Paffett, Juncadella and di Resta, but Mercedes AMG might want to use the opportunity for all the drivers to collect as much experience and information prior to the entry of Mercedes into the series, and at the same time measure the drivers against each other in Formula E cars.
Pietro Fittipaldi is the recent World Series Formula 3.5 Championship, but he has some NASCAR experience as well from the talent series Whelen All-American Series. Pietro is grand son of the double Formula 1 World Champion Emerson Fittipaldi, but with four Championships to his own name during the last six seasons, he has proven his speed.
Michael Benyahia is a 17 year-old Moroccan driver, who is the defending Formula Renault 2.0 NEC Champion. He raced in the French Formula 4 prior to that, and finished third in that Championship in 2016. It will be a brand new thing for him to race an electric car, but the speed is very close to the Formula Renault 2.0 car.
Mitsunori Takaboshi is a Japanese racing driver aged 24, and he won the Japanese All-Japan Formula 3 Championship in 2017. Takaboshi has a connection to Renault through Nissan in Japan, which was the engine in his Formula 3 car, but he still need to make his name known in the big world scene.
Alexander Albon is a rare thing as a Thai racing driver, but he has a bit of British blood in his veins. He finished third in the Formula Renault 2.0 NEC in 2014, while he finished second in GP3 in 2016. 2017 has been a Formula 2 year for him, with two podium positions in his rookie season.
The last driver that will hasn’t been mention is Belgian Sam Dejonghe. He is a multi talent, having raced both single seaters, GT cars and touring cars. He has finished in the top-3 in both the European F3 Open and MRF Challenge – Formula 2000 Championships. He has a few starts in the Auto GP too, while the last few seasons primarily has been racing in the TCR Benelux Touring Car Championship, finishing fifth during the past two seasons.
The full list of Formula E Rookie Test drivers and their teams can be seen below.
