We arrive on site on Thursday evening after a lengthy camel-dodging drive north, and tour the track in a Toyota Hilux. TG spoke to most of the drivers, and the feeling was that female empowerment is better served by actually coming here to race rather than protesting about it. A recent report by human rights organisation Grant Liberty claims Saudi Arabia has spent £1.1bn on ‘sportswashing’ in the past few years, and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is actively rebranding the country as environmentally proactive (forget all the oil). There are other issues, not least the inescapable fact that XE is kicking off in Saudi Arabia, a country in which homosexuality is still illegal, free speech repressed and women were only allowed to drive three years ago. It’s oddly affecting to see the mighty Carlos Sainz swinging a bin bag over his shoulder But it’s a talking point, and it’s oddly affecting to see the mighty Carlos Sainz swinging a bin bag over his shoulder. It risks looking like the worst kind of virtue signalling, and plenty of people here have seen the inside of a private jet on more than one occasion. So we wander through the sand picking up crap, a tiny gesture that will be amplified via some powerful social media feeds. Rising sea levels are flooding the hatchlings before they’re born, while the plastic detritus washing up on the world’s beaches is proving deadly to all sorts of marine life. The next morning we abandon ship and are driven to a remote beach, and the spot on which endangered turtles are born and miraculously return to in order to lay their eggs, after 30 years of swimming the oceans. None are in the habit of wasting their time. Most of the XE grid is onboard, including Jenson Button and Carlos Sainz, along with motorsport luminaries such as David Coulthard, David Richards, Zak Brown, and Nico Rosberg, as well as some of the world’s fastest women. Well, he has a high quality audience tonight. As we all settle in, he notes in his introductions that an academic is delighted if a new paper gets a peer review, and overjoyed if it’s published in a scientific journal that might be read by 1,000 people. XE’s lead climate scientist is Professor Richard Washington, the driver of its sustainability remit. The ship’s first officer, a dry-witted Irish fellow called Nevan Holland, says he hopes X won’t mark the spot as the St Helena makes her passage through pirate-infested waters en route to the next round in Senegal. A hydroponic system onboard enables the chefs to grow their own produce. More importantly, the swimming pool is now a science lab for XE’s experts to conduct experiments in each territory they visit. But she can also now sleep up to 175 people, with several well-appointed lounges in which to entertain and inform. She has two cranes, two huge hatches and a hydraulic floor. In fairness, her two 57-litre Mirrlees Blackstone engines now run on the cleanest low sulphur marine diesel available rather than the evil ‘bunker’ fuel that’s global transport’s dirtiest secret. People have grumbled about her diesel power, but there’s no doubt the St Helena is a very cool thing, the “soul of Extreme E”, according to series founder Alejandro Agag. Heading across the Red Sea towards her in a brace of tenders is a poignant reminder of our beautiful world, as the fat, orange sun drops swiftly behind the horizon in an evocative and provocative act of nature. It’s a floating paddock, apologetically emblazoned with the words ‘not electric yet’ and a giant black X. That’s where the St Helena, a former Royal Mail cargo vessel newly refitted to accommodate XE’s 63 containers and nine cars, comes in. The first venue in an acutely climate conscious series that will later visit Africa, Greenland, Brazilian rainforest, and the tip of Argentina, with a male and female driver line-up, this is racing off-the-grid which makes moving around a challenge in itself. Think pod racing sequence in Star Wars prequel The Phantom Menace via Indiana Jones and Mad Max: Fury Road. An area the size of Belgium, it manages the feat of looking ancient and feeling spiritual, while also generating a serious sci-fi vibe. There’s serious talent on the XE grid, including motorsport royalty, and they know they’ve got their hands full.Īl-’Ula is in the north-west Medina region of Saudi Arabia. Inevitably, they are forced to back off a bit, but that doesn’t solve the dust problem. Even the silkiest drivers can’t legislate for an airborne Extreme E car landing at a tricky angle and pitching into a rut. It’s what happens when the car, a 550bhp pure-electric Dakar-style beast, gets out of shape over the sand. As perilous as it looks, the 30-metre descent isn’t the problem.
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