International Motorsport Roundup: F1 Car Launches, 2020 MotoGP Pre-season Testing, Formula-E Mexico E-Prix, And More

Pre-season action commenced in F1 and MotoGP alongside a race event. It started off with six Formula One teams launching their 2020 machines as well as postponing a race event. Pre-season testing kicked off for the 2020 MotoGP season in Malaysia. We also had Volkswagen commence testing of its new Race Polo post its Auto Expo 2020 unveil. WRC saw the Rally Of Sweden while Formula-E had an action-packed round 4 in Mexico. Here’s all about it in detail:

Formula One

With pre-season testing just around the corner, this week saw a slew of teams launching their 2020 challengers. Ferrari, RedBull, McLaren, Mercedes and Alpha Tauri officially took the wraps off their 2020 challengers. Alfa Romeo also silently revealed its 2020 car, however, it was shod in a camo testing livery. Renault and Haas only gave us glimpses of their 2020 challengers through renders and will officially launch them once testing starts on February 19 along with Williams and Racing Point.

Besides car launch dates, Formula One confirmed the inevitable by postponing the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai owing to health scares over the ongoing Coronavirus crisis in the country. A new date is yet to be confirmed, but it will be difficult to cram it into an already packed 22-race season.

MotoGP

MotoGP’s first pre-season test of 2020 kicked off at the Sepang International Circuit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with most manufacturers being less than half a second off each other over the course of the three-day test. At the end of it, the only consistent rider was 2019 Rookie Of The Year, Fabio Quartararo, topping all three days for the Petronas Yamaha SRT team. Things got off to a difficult start for reigning world champion Marc Marquez, who is still recovering from his shoulder surgery. Since this is the testing stage, lap times shouldn’t really be taken so seriously as plenty of teams hold back. Expect a little more pace at the Qatar test on February 22 ahead of the season opener.

Formula-E

The international motorsport week rounded off with Round 4 of the 2019/2020 ABB FIA Formula-E Championship at Mexico City. The race weekend saw Porsche take first pole position with Andre Lotterer. Jaguar’s Mitch Evans and Nyck de Vries took third for Mercedes. The race, however, as has been the case in past seasons was a whole different story. Evans swifty snatched the lead from Lotterer and went on to dominate and win the Mexico E-Prix. The main action was all behind him while a tense battle for second, third and fourth ensued between Nissan’s Sebastian Buemi and the two DS Techeetahs of Antonio Felix Da Costa and Jean Eric Vergne. 

In the end, Da Costa wound up second ahead of Buemi in third to round off the podium. Towards the end of the race, we saw big names such as Sam Bird and Stoffel Vandoorne drop out of the race to really shuffle up the championship fight. Alexander Sims, however, managed to limit a big hit to his title campaign with a strong drive from 19th to 5th in the end. Mitch Evans now holds the lead in the standings ahead of Alexander Sims by 1 point with Da Costa in third. A two-week gap will see Formula-E head off to Marrakesh for Round 5.

WRC

In the world of off-road motorsports, the second round of the season commenced at the Rally of Sweden amidst frozen and remote forests. Toyota’s of Elfyn Evans took top honours ahead of reigning WRC Champion Ott Tanak for Hyundai. Kalle Rovanpera took a surprise third for Toyota to become the youngest podium finisher at the age of 19. Evans took the win by a comfortable margin of 12.7 seconds over the rest. Monte Carlo Rally winner Thierry Neuville wound up sixth for Hyundai.  

Others

Shortly after Volkswagen unveiled its Race Polo car at Auto Expo 2020, the car made its testing debut at the Madras Motor Speedway in Chennai during the farewell race weekend for the Ameo Cup race cars it will replace for the 2020 season. It is powered by a 1.8-litre TSI petrol mill producing 210PS and 320Nm, paired to a 6-speed sequential gearbox with paddle shift. The main talking point about the race-spec Polo is that it features a push-to-pass system to encourage overtaking. This system gives the Polo a 20PS boost to produce 230PS.

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