Story By: EXTREME E – LONDON, UK – Kevin Hansen heads to the next round in Scotland leading the Extreme E championship alongside Veloce Racing team-mate Molly Taylor. We caught up with the Swede ahead of the Hydro X Prix as he looks for a repeat success at the team’s upcoming home event.
Extreme E: You’re going into the Hydro X Prix as the championship leader! How does that feel?
Kevin Hansen: It feels great to be the championship leader! It’s exactly where we aim to be and where we hope to be and where we worked to be as well. The team has put an incredible effort in over the past six months especially, but also the last two years to get to this point. It’s great to finally start off on a great note and to be the championship leaders. It’s exactly where we want to be and hope to stay.
Extreme E: Now that the dust has settled – could you sum up in three words the opening round in NEOM?
KH: That’s an interesting one. I would go with ‘Veloce, Live Fast’. The team’s success is down to just hard work and the team spirit that is incredibly nice. Everybody is so hungry for success. We believe in each other and have confidence in the whole team, from content to engineering to drivers and we take on each weekend as a collective group. We go out there on the track to perform at our best and I think that is what we have created our success from.
Each individual in the team is doing their upmost and they’re hungry for doing their best and that is the perfect way to work in this championship.
Extreme E: You picked up a win and a second-place finish in Saudi Arabia. Does the new sporting format suit you?
KH: Yes, I think it suits me. It’s more of a similar amount of driving to what I am used to. There is a lot of on-track action, three times a day, and you still have a lot of time to analyse the racing and to work on your driving. You also get more time in the car which is really cool so I would say the new race format is great. It is definitely more like rallycross – there are more head-to-heads and that is something that I really enjoy. I like the challenge of that and just trying to be a bit clever out on course. Trying different things and being creative is always interesting.
I think the format suits me nicely, and Molly also, which is very good so we work well together, and can prepare really well for the races and strategy out on course.
Extreme E: Looking ahead to Scotland, are you confident of another strong showing at the Hydro X Prix?
KH: I am hopeful that we are going to be up there fighting for wins and podiums once again in Scotland. You never know where the others will be, but I think we will do well. I am hoping we have some strong days out on course where we will be where we want to be with the ODYSSEY 21. Our approach will remain unchanged, too. We will try to do what we did in the last race and prepare as well as we can with our driving, and also when we get to the location and analyse the track, so I think we can be confident in a strong showing so long as we prepare well.
There’s no reason to believe otherwise. We will just do our thing and hope that ends up meaning podiums for us again.
Extreme E: You’ve actually visited the site as part of the race launch! What did you make of it?
KH: From what I saw at the race launch, the location looks really cool! I think it is definitely one of the most interesting and certainly one of the strongest in terms of sustainability that we can showcase at an Extreme E race. It is incredible what is being planned for the future at the race locations in terms of renewable energy and it is going to be exciting to follow that journey.
Like most Extreme E courses I am sure there will be lots of jumps and difficult parts to navigate out on track, but we are really looking forward to it. I think it will be spectacular.
Extreme E: Will it be the most challenging yet and is it comparable to any other location the Championship has visited?
KH: Although we haven’t seen the track yet, it won’t take all of us long to get up to speed during race week to understand the small details that will really boost performance. I think it will be challenging, especially when it comes to elevation changes, but we are all really excited for the Hydro X Prix. Also, the courses are much shorter compared to Season 1, so it is a little bit different in terms of getting familiar with the course and terrain.
We will be prepared for whatever the weekend throws at us and we’re hoping for another strong result!