Mahindra Racing has announced that Alexander Sims will be replacing Jerome d'Ambrosio in the 2020/21 Formula E championship. Sims joins the Indian factory team having spent the last two seasons with BMW Andretti. Mahindra Racing is yet to announce the second driver to join the line-up for Season 7. However, it is likely that Alex Lynn, who joined Mahindra for the final six races of Season 6 as a replacement to Pascal Wehrlein, could be retained next year. Meanwhile, Wehrlein has been confirmed to join Porsche for the 2020/21 campaign after announcing his exit from Mahindra mid-season.
In a statement, Mahindra thanked d'Ambrosio for his services. The driver spent two years with the team and had secured a race win in Marrakesh and a podium finish in his debut race with the team. There's no word though on where the driver plans to go next.
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Alexander Sims joins Mahindra Racing after spending two years at BMW i Andretti
Speaking on joining Mahindra Racing, Alexander Sims said, "I'm delighted to be joining Mahindra Racing and continuing my Formula E campaign. It is an exciting opportunity to bring on the team's package and challenge for strong results. Promoting sustainability and electric mobility is important to me personally and competing in Formula E provides a strong, innovative and forward-looking platform to raise awareness. I want to thank BMW i Andretti Motorsport for all its support during the past two seasons and wish the team well for the future. It's been a huge learning curve coming into Formula E - it's such a different discipline in motorsport and brings with it great new challenges. I'm excited to continue learning and to use my knowledge to support Mahindra Racing in the upcoming seasons."
Dilbagh Gill, CEO and Team Principal, Mahindra Racing said, "I'm thrilled on behalf of the whole team to welcome Alexander. I'm extremely excited about working with him and the prospect of what we can achieve together is motivating. In Alexander, we have a proven racing talent plus someone that embodies what Mahindra Racing stands for with his personal principles in the areas of electrification and sustainability. He is an intellectual driver, a very nice guy and a team player; I'm enthused about what Season 7 will bring and look forward to announcing Alexander's teammate in due course. At the same time, I would like to pay tribute to Jerome, who leaves us after two years with the team. We have had some great moments together and I wish him all the very best as he moves on to new endeavours. He is a class act and I look forward to seeing what he does next."
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After struggling throughout Season 6, Mahindra Racing is looking at achieving better results in Season 7
Alexander Sims has been a part of Formula E since the beginning but was more in a test and reserve role in the initial seasons. He secured a drive with BMW in Season 5 and went to score a pole position and a second-place finish in the New York e-Prix. He went on to take pole in the doubleheader in Saudi Arabia and his maiden win in Race 2 of the Diriyah e-Prix. He is also the first Formula E driver to take three consecutive pole positions.
The BMW Andretti team has confirmed it will retain Maxmilian Gunther for Season 7 of Formula E but are yet to announce a replacement for Sims. The British driver moves to Mahindra after scoring a victory and podium finish with BMW. However, he couldn't put the same performance as Gunther in Season 6. It is expected that the Munich-based team will deploy one of its DTM drivers to partner with Gunther next year.
Mahindra Racing has been a part of Formula E since Season 1
Sims comes with experience in both single-seaters and sports cars. The driver finished second in the 2008 Formula Renault 2.0 UK Championship and won the McLaren Autosport BRDC Young Driver of the Year Award that same year. He also went on win the 2016 Total 24 Hours of Spa and a first runner-up in the 2015 British GT Championship and the 2017 ADAC Zurich 24 Hour Race at the Nurburgring. He has also won races in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in 2018.
