It’s not unusual for a motorsport championship to announce a provisional calendar that contains a few asterisks on unconfirmed events.
But a list of 12 countries for five event dates, one of which could be in any of five locations, is a little different.
That’s the latest unconventional move from Extreme E, in an announcement entitled “reveals provisional season two calendar” but more accurately described inside as “early insights into how season two’s calendar is shaping up”.
As series founder Alejandro Agag puts it: “We wanted to be transparent about how our second season is shaping up in order to help enable our teams, drivers and partners to prepare.
“We’ve had lots of interest, both in retaining events in locations we’ve visited in season one, and from new locations and we are currently at a stage where we have multiple options for some of our races.
“As an engaged championship which aims to put fans at the heart of decision making, we are also keen to hear input and opinions on where we should go in future seasons too.”
XE’s 2022 season is set to start in Saudi Arabia, as its inaugural campaign did, on February 19-20 and end in Chile on November 26-27.
In between those fixed points is an array of possibilities.
Round two on May 7-8 could be a return to 2021 venue Senegal or a debut in Egypt or Tanzania.
Greenland might stay on the calendar for round three on July 9-10 or Iceland could be used for that one.
Then round four on September 10-11 offers the biggest menu of options: that could be held in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Italy or Costa Rica.
This degree of openness and willingness to share unconfirmed possibilities mirrors the approach Extreme E and previous Agag creation Formula E used with their initial line-ups, when they revealed lists of potentially interested drivers long before the entries were firmed up.
Given the chance of continuing COVID pandemic repercussions affecting all motorsport schedules into 2022, this ‘calendar hint’ is also a pragmatic move.
The final shape of XE’s 2021 calendar is still unclear too.
The next round will next place in Sardinia in a month’s time, but the venue for the December 11-12 is still to be confirmed. XE has already had to drop planned events in Nepal, Brazil and Argentina this year for pandemic-related reasons, with Sardinia the first stand-in to be confirmed.
DirtFish understands that Greece has fallen down the list of options and an event in either the United Kingdom or Morocco is now most likely.
Rosberg X Racing’s Johan Kristoffersson and Molly Taylor currently hold a nine-point championship lead over Cristina Gutierrez and Sébastien Loeb of Lewis Hamilton’s X44 team.
Kristoffersson and Taylor won the first two rounds before Andretti United pair Timmy Hansen and Catie Munnings triumphed in the Arctic.
