Corneli: “It’s a different kind of championship”

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Buenos Aires is getting ready for Formula E and the team’s preparations are well underway. On an extremely warm Thursday afternoon, Andrea Perilli caught up with Venturi’s carbon parts specialist Christophe Corneli, who gave us an insight into his journey in Formula E so far.

Former DTM driver Ellen Lohr greeted me at the front of the garage. The ever lovely and smart German woman was the person who introduced Christophe Corneli to me.

“The FIA Formula E championship is like running, being all the time running: short meeting days; we need to work from Thursday to Saturday so in one meeting we are told all we have to do in three days,” he confessed, as he had just finished working on the carbon parts of the car.

The extreme heat of the Argentinian summer took us to the back of the garage, where he explained me more thing about his job.

“Formula E for me, it’s a different kind of championship, we need to work with electricity, all in electric ways. I had to properly learn how to work in Formula E. Before, I used to work for other championships such as rallies: Dakar, Tunisia, Morocco, and China,” he answered when asked about what he liked the most about the series and what he had to learn in order to work in the fully-electric championship.

Corneli chatting away at the back of the Venturi garage

After Nick Heidfeld earned third place in the 2015 Moscow ePrix following Buemi’s penalty, Formula E saw Venturi reaching the podium again in the 2016 Long Beach ePrix, when Stéphane Sarrazin did a phenomenal drive, finishing in P2.

“Last year was amazing the podium in Long Beach. It was long work for us to be able to “touch” the podium. It was long work since last year, so fighting to get a podium and getting it was just amazing.”

When talking about next Saturday’s race, Christophe expressed how much they want a podium and that it is every race’s main objective. Despite not getting much luck in the series so far, he told us what the team does when things are not going to plan.

“Just work. Work, work, work, and more work. We try to understand what we missed when we went wrong.”

Sarrazin and Maro Engel will drive on Saturday for the Monegasque squad, aiming to get a good result and as Corneli said, a podium as well.

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Images courtesy of Ellen Lohr

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