Twice as many races in 2023: Extreme E switches race format to "double header" ahead of Season 3

The Extreme E also gets a new race format before its third season. This was officially announced by the racing series early Monday morning. The most important change: from now on, two races will be held at each location in the "double-header" format familiar from Formula E. In order to get all the individual races into one weekend, all sessions of an event will take place on just one day.

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The adjustment increases the number of races in Season 3 from five to ten. They continue to start with two qualifying sessions, which now both consist of two heats with five cars each. Previously, the first qualifying session was held as a time trial. Points will continue to be awarded after each qualifying session to provide a cumulative intermediate result. However, from now on, a championship point will also be awarded for the heat win.

To allow all other sessions to take place on the same race day, the rest of the schedule will be greatly streamlined. The semifinals are completely eliminated, because the five best teams of the qualification have automatically reached the final and make there the X-Prix victory among themselves. The remaining five teams will compete against each other in the so-called Redemption Race. Places 6 to 10 will be decided there. Thus, two winning teams will be crowned each weekend in the future and twice as many championship points will be awarded.

Grid play remains in place for finale

The starting positions for the final will continue to be allocated via "grid play". This means that via voting it will be decided who gets to pick their starting position first. The teams that don't make it to the final will also vote for one finalist each. In the Redemption Race, the starting positions are assigned depending on the ranking after qualifying.

There are no changes to the "Continental Traction Challenge." As usual, it is decisive for additional championship points and the deciding criterion in the event of a tie after qualifying.

As in the previous year, the race format is designed for ten cars. Due to the entry of DJ Carl Cox with his own racing team, another team from Season 2 will consequently no longer be present. Who this is, the Extreme E leaves uncommented. The most obvious seems to be that Jenson Button's team JBXE will not return. However, this is pure speculation.

Reach records in season 2 & partnership with Sky Germany

During its winter break, the electric series had also announced that the number of viewers:inside had increased globally by 30 percent compared to the previous year. 135 million people are said to have watched the second season of Extreme E. The majority of these - 90 million viewers - were reached via linear television, with around half - 44 million - via digital offerings. These figures include access via live broadcasts, reruns and highlight shows.

Furthermore, it's exciting to note that according to the series, about 30 percent of Extreme E viewers:are female. As the electric series calculates, this figure would be significantly higher than the average audience for women in motorsports, which is around ten percent.

The Extreme E has also extended its TV deal with Sky Deutschland for Germany. However, the pay-TV broadcaster will limit its coverage to highlight and magazine shows. The races will continue to be shown on ProSieben Maxx and ran.de, respectively.