Maserati’s James Rossiter: “We’ve seen such great potential”

It has been a dream return to the motorsport scene for Maserati, as Maserati MSG Racing have looked imperious in pre-season testing for Season Nine of the ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.

The team’s new signing, Maximilian Günther, has been driving like a man possessed all week at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo, Valencia, with the German having topped the vast majority of the sessions. Throughout Tuesday-Friday, Günther has ended everyday on top except Thursday, with the twenty-five year old having also set a new Formula E lap record in the final afternoon session on Friday.

Edoardo Mortara hasn’t been fair behind all week, with the Swiss driver – who remained with the team through it’s rebranding from ROKIT Venturi Racing to Maserati MSG Racing – having consistently been in the top five all week. He did dip below the top five in the mock-race weekend that was trialed on Wednesday but only just, after finishing sixth. Günther claimed second in the mock-race, despite having topped the practice session and qualifying.

By the end of the week, the duo had completed 597 laps, putting them in a great position looking ahead to the season opener in Mexico City.

Team Principal James Rossiter labelled the side’s performance as “immense”, with Maserati having looked like perhaps the team to beat going into the first round of the new era of the all-electric series.

 “This week has been a huge learning curve for us. With both cars on track, the amount of data we’ve been able to accumulate, and compile has been immense. At this stage, our findings have been very positive, and we’ve already learned a great deal about Gen3 Formula E and our technical package.

“With only four weeks to go until the first race of the season, we need to make sure that we’re fully prepared so we can be as competitive as possible. This week, we’ve seen such great potential from the Maserati MSG Racing team and both of our drivers, and I’m very excited to see how we line up in Mexico City.”

Giovanni Sgro, Head of Maserati Corse, also spoke highly of the team’s performance in Valencia, with Sgro adding that it was visible that the “team is working incredibly well together”.

“It was fantastic to be here in Valencia for our first official test with the new Maserati Tipo Folgore. The car looks very competitive and its performance is evident – having Max and Edo put in the times we’ve seen throughout the week, is a great start to our first season back in racing and hopefully gives us a good indication of what we’re capable of achieving this season.

“We can see the team is working incredibly well together which is going to be fundamental to getting results in this exciting new era of Formula E.”