There is a growing feeling in the Formula E paddock that taking a chance on an unproven rookie might be the way to go for next season in readiness for the Gen4 era hitting in 2026-27.
The first of two central reasons for this are that previous Formula 2 drivers like Taylor Barnard and Dan Ticktum, and to a lesser extent so far Zane Maloney, have come to the fore this season and understood and thrived quickly in the unique pack-racing of Formula E.
The other one is that in Gen4 the pace of the cars and their driveability might suit young F2 drivers and accomplished simulator aces much better than Gen3. Several teams are known to have used multiple non-FE racing drivers in sims recently to gauge what might be possible for the future.
Several seasoned drivers will likely fall off the Formula E grid by 2026-27. Sam Bird, Lucas di Grassi, Edoardo Mortara, Robin Frijns, Stoffel Vandoorne and Sebastien Buemi are the likely candidates. But here’s the compromise that could allow some of those to continue.
They know how to develop these cars and they know the techniques to employ in getting the best out of the powertrain and the myriad software and systems used on the cars.
This is the dilemma that teams are weighing up for next season and the season after. Youth or experience?
Should they go for the former then there are several key candidates already with experience, all of whom are at Berlin Tempelhof.
'I'd quite happily have that driver'
Alpine Formula 1 junior Gabriele Mini (above, left) - an increasingly familiar face in Formula E testing, and also a driver in a Formula 2 rookie season that had started brightly but really gone off the boil as of late - was the standout on the timing screens.
Driving for Nissan, which sealed the drivers' title with Oliver Rowland this past weekend, was quickest in the morning and the afternoon in full 350kW power, all-wheel drive mode.
The availability of that mode makes for a steep learning curve, with Andretti tester Frederik Vesti describing it as "like driving two different race cars in the same run", but Mini was also a frontrunner in the standard 300kW timesheets.
But how much are singular laptimes worth, and what do teams actually look at?
Top three in morning
1 Gabriele Mini (Nissan) 57.643s
2 Kush Maini (Mahindra) 57.659s
3 Jak Crawford (Andretti) 57.875s
Top three in afternoon
1 Gabriele Mini (Nissan) 57.428s
2 Ayhancan Guven (Porsche) 57.654s
3 Kush Maini (Mahindra) 57.787s
"I mean, obviously, to be at the top of the timesheets at the end of the day is always nice to have. But we also look at consistency of the runs," Andretti team principal Roger Griffiths told The Race.
"Is it a one-off time that somebody's able to pull together when they tighten the belts or really go for it, or is it something they can do repeatedly? We also look to see how they get to it. Are they progressively chipping away at the individual sectors, making small improvements?
"We look to see how many mistakes do they make during the course of day - and a 'mistake' can just be, how many times they lock up going into Turn 1, how many times they miss the apex.
"How good are they at following instruction? This is not a straightforward car to drive, there's a lot of systems on it.
"So we're looking to see from that aspect - how do they work with the engineers, how do they work with the team, how do they interact with the media? I went over to listen to Frederik [Vesti] in the media pen just now, just curiosity, how is he in front of an audience, how does he behave, how does he carry himself?
"What kind of feedback do they give? Is it very general, like 'yeah, the car's great', 'got a bit of understeer in Turn 3' or whatever it is - or is it very detailed, being able to break down the corner into entry, mid and exit, talking about how the car transitions perhaps from oversteer on entry to understeer on exit?
"Obviously, first and foremost they need to be quick. Racing's all about going quick. But with this car patience is a virtue as well."
"You need to be a little bit careful [looking at laptimes]," DS Penske tech chief Phil Charles told The Race.
With three tyre sets available - two new and one used - and very different strategies employed in terms of keeping tyre temperature between runs (or deliberately letting it drop to test the warm-up), "it's very difficult for you go compare apples with apples until you've really got all the data together".
"The honest answer with you is, it takes a long time to work it all out. It's also fair to say that, even with all of that comparison you have to do, generally the quick guys do kind of come to the top. But you can have some occasions where they haven't done 350s, they haven't done a tyre in that particular scenario, and they're mid-grid - but actually when you look at it, you go 'wow, that's actually a really good laptime'."
Mini's peak laptime was four tenths better than the pole lap from the day before set by Pascal Wehrlein. This wasn't so relevant given the weather during the weekend - but it wasn't totally irrelevant either.
"It's an indication of two things - one, the track is very different today, much warmer, you haven't had the rain," said Charles.
"And it had a good day's running yesterday, no major rain overnight, and then it's improved-improved in the morning. So, you should be quicker.
"But having said that, it's not like we're talking massive-massive amounts of laptime. So this is a good grid of rookies. It really is a strong grid.
"If you look up and down the timing sheet, there are a lot of drivers in here that you would say 'ah, I'd quite happily have that driver in my race team'. These are good rookies now."
Who could join soon?
There was a wide variety of drivers in attendance, as is usual for a Formula E rookie test.
F1 junior drivers like Mini, Alex Dunne (McLaren) and Dino Beganovic (Ferrari), who will remain for now laser-focussed on the dream of grand prix racing.
Beganovic, impressed with Mahindra which he'd described as being like a "mini F1 team", said: "I think there's definitely a bright future for Formula E, but my goal remains the same, which is F1 at the moment. But you can never exclude it [Formula E] potentially being something [for me] in the future."
Then there were the really eclectic names - take, for instance, the Porsche line-up, with GT3 specialist Ayhancan Guven and Formula 4 driver Elia Weiss, the 16-year-old son of well-known sportscar racer Claudia Huertgen.
Guven unsurprisingly acquitted himself very well, despite a total unfamiliarity with single-seater racing - to the point where he spent the early laps worrying "if something was wrong in the helmet" because of the amount of wind hitting him, before the team reassured him everything was OK.
For Guven, GT3 remains the true passion and Formula E is a "why not in the future, but for sure not in the short term". For Weiss, it's too early to think about even a proper development role, much less a race seat.
So who are the drivers in the picture for the start of Gen4 - or even for the final season of Gen3Evo coming up later this year?
With probable seats available in the short term at Andretti, Envision and Kiro, the key candidates are Felipe Drugovich (who didn't test, having instead scored points as a stand-in during the weekend's actual racing), Vesti, Jak Crawford and perhaps even Theo Pourchaire.
In Drugovich’s case he is the most armed with race experience and may come into at least Mahindra’s thinking for a Mortara or Nyck de Vries replacement in 2027. But Kush Maini - a Mahindra reserve in FE, an Alpine reserve in F1 and an F2 regular - also made a decently compelling case in Berlin, as evidenced by the test times.
Vesti and Crawford both have a genuine chance - team boss Griffiths didn't at all shy away from confirming this - at joining Jake Dennis at Andretti next season and, if they thrived, then perhaps they could even lead that team in ’27. That’s dependent on their F1 possibilities, believed to be with Cadillac and Racing Bulls respectively.
"It's definitely interesting - Formula E is a world championship, I want to be world champion," said Vesti.
"Also Formula E has some of the greatest active racing drivers. For sure that makes it interesting. Let's see what happens. I'm just happy to be here today."
Pourchaire, "a little tired" but enthusiastic after having flown in from the World Endurance Championship round in Brazil, admitted he has some interest in getting into a Formula E seat as early as possible.
"I feel ready to drive at any time in Formula E. From next season, why not?" said Pourchaire, who also repeatedly mentioned the allure of a twin Formula E/WEC programme.
"At the moment, no§thing is sure. I think it would be great for sure, before going into Gen4, to have a bit more race experience."
Ultimately, though, Pourchaire feels more likely for a Peugeot WEC seat next season, with Nick Cassidy, Jean-Eric Vergne, Maximilian Guenther and the freshly Penske-signed Taylor Barnard likely to take up the four Stellantis seats in the final Gen3Evo campaign. Pourchaire's Gen4 chances should be a lot stronger.
Real outsiders, and, let’s face it, 18 months ago that was what Barnard was in FE circles, are drivers like Nikita Bedrin and Alessandro Giusti - who could create surprises and thrust themselves into contention, too.
Bedrin, who shares a common career benefactor with Barnard in PHM AIX Racing team founder Paul Muller, told The Race that his current Formula E opportunity - with the test coming as part of his new DS Penske development role - is "the best chance, the coolest chance" available to him career-wise.
And there's a real fondness for him in Charles, who says he has been very impressive in the simulator and has compared well in this test to ex-Formula 1 driver Daniil Kvyat. Both Kvyat and Bedrin, Charles said, would be ready to race in Formula E right now.
It’s an interesting time in this driver market - with the series almost between two rules generations and the vibe of 'out with the old and in with the new' building a lot of momentum.
