Was the second Formula E Evo Sessions a success?
With the return of the Evo Sessions, this time being streamed live, was this second attempt any better than the first and is it an avenue Formula E should pursue?
Whilst the main championship had wrapped up Rounds 4 and 5 in Jeddah, Sunday saw the second edition of the Evo Sessions held.
The Evo Sessions sees ten content creators drive in the various teams’ actual Formula E race cars, with the aim of bringing more eyes to the sport through the involvement of various creators with large followings online.
This year saw the event streamed live for the first time, with the initial event taking place as a on-demand event only in Miami one year ago.
With a competitive element thrown in, the Evo Sessions were touted as the next big thing for Formula E’s progression towards a wider following.
So, did this year’s edition see improvements to the overall product?
Did it see the risky aspects of the entire concept pay off?
Let’s go through the positives and negatives of the 2026 Evo Sessions.
All twelve content creators involved in this year’s event in Jeddah (Credit: Formula E)
+: Competitive format
From the outset, the addition of a competitive element to the event’s format brought a lot more jeopardy into the mix, a positive for the spectacle the event would promise.
With this being in the form of the Qualifying format that has been utilised in Formula E in recent seasons, it would test the novices to their limit, ensuring that they would have to lay out their best performances with a single attempt each.
This also meant the format, on paper at least, would be compact and easy to digest for those watching for the first time.
It all came to a fantastic conclusion in the Final, which saw Behzinga go up against TheBurntChip, the two clear stand-outs during this season’s event.
An enthralling final saw the two trade advantages throughout the lap, with the advantage eventually falling in the way of the Jaguar of Chip, taking home the grand prize of winning the Final by less than half a second, and by extension, the Evo Sessions.
Overall, this was the greatest strength of the format.
-: … a flawed format
Whilst the competitive nature of the event would bring in the extra incentive of fighting for a grand prize, the team format would fall flat very quickly.
A preliminary Qualifying seeding session saw the ten creators get each a 15 minute session of solo running to set a fastest time which would determine their seeding going into the Duels format.
With only eight of the ten participants able to progress, it saw the bottom two creators end up in a “Wooden Spoon” race.
What also quickly occurred was that most duels would take place between teammates, leading to the team vs team aspect being dulled down substantially.
This also would lead to teams opting for a certain driver to slow down in certain duels for their favoured driver to progress onwards, see the second Semi Final.
Let’s talk about the points…
Flawed.
With teammates facing against each other, it would lead to guaranteed points being secured, no matter the result of the duel, leading to “fixing”.
A quirk of the format allowed each team’s respective team principal to nominate a single driver from their own team to secure double points in a certain duel, with the caveat that they would have to win to earn the double effect.
This was the main reason for the Semi Final fix, as they had to pre-nominate a driver ahead of the duel beginning.
For a “Wooden Spoon” race, it had the same (?!) impact on points score that the eventual final would do. I’m shocked at how this can make the event look other than just social exposure experiment, rather than anything legitimate.
Cars would also not feature in certain duels, which would cause byes in affected match-ups, leading to long times between action.
-: Damaged cars
Utilising the full season cars was always a massive risk, with any damage inflicted having significant consequences on the respective full time driver’s season.
This just didn’t happen once, it happened twice.
In the preliminary sessions, Juca, who was driving the Cupra Kiro car of Dan Ticktum, lost it on one of his final attempts heading into Turn 17, leading to left rear contact with the inside wall of Turn 18.
The resulting damage led to a driveshaft being broken, leading to a forfeit for Juca in any further duel he was scheduled to be featured in.
More consequently, the Cupra Kiro team will now have to rebuild the car in time for Madrid, fortunately in five weeks time.
Later in the second Quarter Final, which saw Izzy Hammond drive in the duel that should’ve featured Juca.
On her timed lap, she had difficulty slowing for Turn 13, leading to a sizable accident against the concrete wall on the outside. The impact was registered at over 25G, causing the medical car and extraction team being called to assist Izzy.
Lola Yamaha ABT saw the car of Zane Maloney completely written off, with at the very least a chassis change required, a significant amount of damage needing to be repaired.
Some comments, (which we will get on to…), pointed the finger at Hammond for the incident.
However, she does have experience driving with cars as she is an automotive creator.
Her radio message after the incident suggested that a braking issue, where the car fails to slow, was to blame. From the various bits of replays that were shown, this definitely lines up, with Izzy desperately trying to angle the car as to not hit the concrete wall head on.
Plenty of severe conversations will be had between teams and Formula E as to where the Evo Sessions heads in the future, but these incidents brought to life the real risks involved in an event like this.
-: Clashing audiences
Speaking from personal experience watching the event, it was less than 1% of those that follow Formula E in any guise actually following the event live.
This led to the chat being predominantly dominated in community exclusive jibes and jokes, some that were unfortunately not in good taste and really crossed the line of what’s acceptable in a live chat in a sport such as Formula E.
A significant amount of sexism was present, most evident in the aftermath of the accident of Izzy Hammond.
It didn’t stop there.
When it was the turn of Emelia Hartford, someone who is deeply entrenched within car culture having recently competed on the famous Pikes Peak hillclimb, similarly distasteful comments were not hard to come by.
Whilst not a fair reflection of the communities involved, it really wasn’t a good look for anyone’s audiences.
Talking of audiences, let’s talk about the pure numbers of those who tuned in live.
To say this was an event that the total following of creators combined somewhere in the region over 250million, only a maximum 26,000 people watched concurrently at any point.
This is, quite honestly, a meagre return for an event that was streamed exclusively on YouTube, the home to many of the creator’s careers.
For comparison, Squeezie’s similar idea of a content creator racing event GPExplorer, was watched by several millions live back in late last year, with creators with nowhere near the following of those involved in the Evo Sessions.
This points to a fundamental issue with Formula E, exposure.
Exposing the sport to as many eyeballs as possible was the aim of the series, but when you have a singular creator creating, planning and participating in their own event against a whole organisation’s effort being seen by 20 times the people live, something is fundamentally wrong.
May I even mention the lack of any self promotion of the series, on it’s OWN channel?
No Gen 4 promotion?
I found it hard to write this article with the amount of negativity I have included, but I do mean this in the best interests of the sport.
I hate really being negative about the sport that has given me so much for the last 12 years, getting me through various points in life where I needed a boost.
But when you have something as conflicting, confusing and flat feeling as this event, you have to voice your opinions clearly and constructively.
As for where this event goes in the future, I find it somewhat hard to believe to think this event will continue in the format it has been conducted this year, with a overhaul of the format and type of venue (one that has large, safe run-offs) needed desperately for this to continue.
With the introduction of the Gen 4 cars, the creators shouldn’t get anywhere near the machines in the current situation the Evo Sessions finds itself. More power and higher risks should come with that car, significantly reducing the chances of those machines being used. Retired Gen 3 machines will be the likely candidates.
I applaud Formula E for attempting things that other official series haven’t dared to try, that’s what I love about the sport, being different.
But I sincerely hope that this even is critically dissected back at Formula E and Liberty Global HQ to improve the event in the future, or other similar attempts of exposing Formula E in a positive light.
T.