Vandoorne remains hopeful: 'We have made a lot of progress'

Stoffel Vandoorne is hopeful that his season is still salvageable. At the press conference ahead of the Sao Paolo ePrix, the reigning world champion reflected on his current season and the opportunities still ahead for himself and the team.

Vandoorne is experiencing a very difficult season in Formula E. Last year, the Belgian still managed to win the title with Mercedes after his teammate Nyck de Vries did the same a year earlier. However, this year, Mercedes are no longer competing, so Vandoorne moved to DS Penske. But at his new team, Vandoorne has struggled to continue his success of the previous year: so far, Vandoorne has only managed to collect 11 points, which puts him in a paltry 13th place in the championship. Pascal Wehrlein, the championship leader, currently stands on 80 points.

Vandoorne sees light at the end of the tunnel

Vandoorne's teammate Jean-Eric Vergne also started the season equally poorly: in the first three races, the Frenchman managed to finish in the points only once. But at the fourth race, in Hyderabad, that suddenly changed. Vergne won the race, and in the following race, Vergne was able to finish second. According to Vandoorne, the team can draw hope from this after these improved results.

"I think the very start of the season was obviously a little difficult for us," reflects Vandoorne. "I think we didn’t do a good enough job to get the maximum out of the car. But recently, it has been going a lot better, especially with JEV’s being on the podium twice in a row now. I think for my side, quite a few things haven’t been falling into place yet, but we’re still making steps forward, and that’s encouraging. I think I just need a smooth weekend, and then I’ll be in good shape."