Mitch Evans says losing the Formula E title in Berlin hurt him for several weeks.
Evans and Jaguar Racing saw their promising 2020 season drastically collapse with the Kiwi slumping from second to seventh in the standings in the space of just six races.
Berlin had never been kind to Evans in the past with the Kiwi only having finished in the top-ten once in the previous three visits. But he and Jaguar were unquestionably crushed by their rivals across all six races of the 2020 season finale.
Ninth in the first race would be his best qualifying result, and Evans would only score on three occasions. While eventual champion Antonio Felix da Costa earned over 90 points over the week, Evans would snare just 12.
While the team later admitted they felt a patent qualifying flaw cost Evans a shot at the title, their star driver revealed that everything unravelled away from him across the week.
“I’ve not felt that hurt for a long time,” Evans told The Race. “It hurt for weeks.
“When you see something so close… but every race, it just seemed to drift away. We sort of handed it to da Costa and Techeetah. It was a real disappointment, it really hurt.”
Given the incredibly tight nature of the all-electric formula, winning the overall championship is a reward of season-long consistency. Only twice in six seasons has the eventual champion claimed the most race wins across the campaign.
Thus, sporadic mistakes such as when a communication error at Marrakesh had Evans, who was leading the championship at the time, qualify last can prove detrimental to a championship challenge.
“What happened in Marrakesh was obviously embarrassing,” added Evans.
“But throughout the whole team, everyone’s going to the next level and ironing out anything that potentially could happen or has happened in the past.
“You’re always going have slight issues in the season, that’s just the way it is. We are all human at the end of the day. But minimising those are going to be extremely critical to win the championship.
“I’ve got full confidence in the team around me to make those little mistakes not happen anymore.”
The silver-lining for Evans’ difficulties over the Berlin finale was it tested the grit of Jaguar, and he says it has had a positive impact on the team ahead of the new season.
“I think even the final result doesn’t really show what we achieved last season,” said Evans.
“We left there with our tail between our legs, and we were just super-disappointed. But that has fired up everyone for the new season.
“In that circumstance during Berlin, it can go either way internally in a team. You can start breaking down, blaming each other pointing fingers and all that. But it was just the complete opposite. We pulled together.
“Obviously, we’re trying to find answers and I think a lot of the answers we were trying to find were obviously a bit unrealistic because of the qualifying situation.”
The Kiwi’s 2021 challenger is mooted to be released next week with the British marque teasing images of the new look on social media this morning.
Official pre-season testing will go ahead from the Valencia circuit on November 28 to December 1. It will also be the last proper opportunity for Evans to get to grips with his latest machine before the season opener in Chile on January 16.