Antonio Felix da Costa is set to move on from Porsche before the new Formula E season as one of the series' longest running sagas finally ends.
The 2019-20 champion has scored six E-Prix wins with Porsche, which he joined in 2023, but also had a fractious relationship with the team that began to develop at the end of that first year.
Although not yet confirmed, The Race can reveal that da Costa's exit is expected to be communicated next month, with both parties having negotiated tirelessly over a long period of time, including at the London E-Prix season finale at the end of July and since.
The impasse in their relationship is believed to have occurred after Porsche expressed a desire to keep da Costa for a fourth season, something it is believed to have had a contractual lead on.
But da Costa, who is known to have had several offers from rival teams on the table this summer, is believed to have articulated that he wanted to move on from the team for the 2025-26 and undertake a fresh challenge.
This began a complex chain of events that involved da Costa and his manager, former Formula 1 driver Tiago Monteiro, and Porsche entering lengthy extrication solutions.
While the specifics of those discussions have been kept under close wraps, The Race understands that they eventually led to Porsche agreeing to allow da Costa an amicable exit.
He has been strongly linked to Jaguar, where he would join Mitch Evans after Nick Cassidy's exit for the MSG team that's about to become Citroen.
Porsche and da Costa both declined to comment on the situation when contacted by The Race this week. But an announcement of his exit, a replacement for him, and da Costa's own next steps in Formula E are expected to be officially revealed next month.
The mystery incident that broke a relationship
Da Costa and Porsche team-mate Pascal Wehrlein have essentially not spoken at length since the start of the 2024-25 season, with this fracture in their relationship believed to be a significant contributing reason for da Costa wanting to move on.
The Race has uncovered that a so-far unspecified incident prior to the start of the Sao Paulo season opener last December, while the pair were on a parade lap of the track, was never resolved and led to a complete breakdown in their relationship.
Da Costa and Wehrlein had a reasonably positive and collaborative relationship in their first two seasons as team-mates, although the previous campaign did feature several tense moments, as a poor start from da Costa across the first three races meant he was essentially assigned to a support role in Wehrlein's ultimately successful title push.
But amid this came a tense period when da Costa felt he did not receive the required backing from some of the management of the Porsche team, who elected to test Nico Mueller in-season and then sign him on to a factory contract.
This unsettled da Costa, although ironically he then went on a remarkable spree of four wins in five races at Berlin, Shanghai and a double at Portland to become an outside title challenger himself.
Mueller is still the favourite for da Costa's seat, although not the only driver in the running to replace.
The Swiss was essentially placed at Porsche customer team Andretti for 2024-25, although struggled to match the pace and points-scoring capability of team-mate Jake Dennis.
While Dennis finished the season seventh in the standings with two podiums and 93 points, Mueller was eight places and 45 points further back.
The Race says
At last, the saga is over.
Da Costa, after months, if not years of both discord and glory in his role at Porsche, appears to be moving on. In a sense so can we all.
The marriage between them, which looked to be initially made in heaven when he signed in the summer of 2022, never really settled as it should have.
Even amid the glory of one of Formula E's all-time great victories at Cape Town in February 2023 just five races into his tenure at Porsche, did it ever feel like da Costa and Porsche properly gelled? The truth was that while there was respect, there never appeared to be love.
What were the factors of da Costa's and Porsche's discontent, and why was it such a fraught relationship?
From da Costa's side perhaps, it was the combination of an edict that detailed he had to cease sportscar racing. That came in October 2023 and it certainly displeased him greatly.
Then there was the team testing Mueller in-season in March 2024 before signing the then Abt Cupra driver on a factory Porsche deal shortly afterwards.
There were many other things, including the perception of Wehrlein essentially part-controlling certain aspects of the team and how they functioned together. But was da Costa partly to blame in not seeing this from an early stage too?
"I do blame myself partly for this yes, which is, when Porsche hired me, I was coming from DS, in season eight [2021-22], I was the best qualifier in Formula E, I was winning races, and then I have my first season with Porsche, and it's so-so, it wasn't great," da Costa told The Race last month at the London E-Prix.
"And then we start the second season, and it was also a huge disaster. So, I got a little bit of a number two feeling and a kind of a helper, a water boy stamp in the team.
"I'm part of results when they don't work out, it's never just one entity, it's never just the driver, it's never just the engineer, it's never just the car, we are a team and we win and lose together.
"But I am not going to deny that I felt a little bit of that stamp in here, and part of the process for me this year was trying to get rid of that, and it wasn't always clear to everyone. We can call it almost like muscle memory, and whenever the two cars were on track together.
"I always felt like I had to ask harder to be free again. I blame myself a little bit for putting myself initially in that position, but it is something that I had to work myself around."
These are interesting words from da Costa. He's a man who wears his heart on his sleeve and we hope that never changes. He's a character who says what he thinks which in many ways is of course a huge positive.
He's too old to change now at 33 and for many that is great news. But could the Porsche experience filter into his professional outlook and change the way he operates across a team? Should he, as expected, sign to replace his mate Cassidy at Jaguar, then it might be a slightly different da Costa we see, such were the extremes in culture clashes between himself and some elements of the Porsche team.
Ultimately da Costa wants to enjoy his racing. He gets more than just a kick out of what he does for a living. He loves every aspect of it and that's why he's usually thrived at teams with different cultures, even the intensely French one at DS which could be tricky to read from the outside let alone the inside.
"I think you have two ways of doing it," added da Costa in London.
"One of them is anti-natural to me, which is to leave my house, pack my bag, come here, do a job, and go back home. Not having any fun, not enjoying what I'm doing, literally doing a job.
"I would think that is really throwing this beautiful thing that we can call our job, motorsports, in the bin if you do it that way.
"It's not my preferred way of doing it. Ideally, I like to be in a place where I can laugh with everybody in the garage and there's no tension. The garage should be a safe place where I come and it's just light. As we know, that's not the situation at the moment.
"Fine, it is what it is. But I think that would be the way, just to kind of suck it up and get through it. We're so lucky to call this our jobs and why should we be miserable through them? We should be understanding how lucky we are to call this our job. So, that's how I'm looking at it."
It's a kind of philosophy da Costa has. Slightly romanticised yes but it's one that works for him and one that his many fans rejoice in.
For Porsche, or certainly elements within it anyway, there is a different outlook and way of operating. It's an analytical one that is more binary in many senses. One is not greater than the other, it's just a different cultural outlook and methodology that some enjoy and some don't.
Porsche is not a soulless, automaton necessary team. This needs to be made clear. But the compatibility for what da Costa expected and seemed to need just didn't match as expected. It happens in any business, every day of the year. It's just that within a brand as esteemed and legendary as Porsche it is quite a shock when it occasionally happens.
We don't know Wehrlein's version of events because he keeps his heart within his sleeve, not on it. It's just a different method of operating. He keeps his counsel as is his want.
The da Costa years have generally been good for Porsche, especially the last where he contributed to a first ever teams' and manufacturers' double, meaning that along with Wehrlein's 2024 drivers' title, Porsche is the first to win all three.
History will reflect that da Costa and Porsche won a lot together. And were occasionally very good together. But they didn't seem to love one another.
Clearly for one, a bit more than the other, this mattered greatly.
