Dragon Racing rookie Neel Jani aims to be in contention for podiums in his debut season of Formula E, a series he has been looking to join since Season 1.

The Swiss driver had been hoping to join the all-electric series in the early days of the championship but was committed to Porsche in the World Endurance Championship, with whom he won the title in 2016 as well as the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

“I’ve been interested in Formula E since Season 1,” explained Jani. “It’s just I signed for Porsche in that moment, the programme was too big and there was no time. But after stopped I reactivated the contact and I found my space.

“I think there are several ‘futures’ out there, but I still think [Formula E] is something buzzing right now. All the manufacturers want to come here, that’s a big fact for itself. The developing curve is huge, the cars will be completely different in five years from what we see now.

“Mobility is changing world-wide and racing is always part, like in Le Mans 24 Hours. Formula E is making a new history in mobility.”

With two days of official testing at the Ricardo Tormo Circuit in Valencia under his belt, the 33-year-old has been making the most of the opportunity to learn as much about the car as possible, which so far he has found admittedly difficult to drive.

“I’ve focused very much on race-runs in the last two days. I think I’m the one who did the most laps. My focus was to get the energy saving management correctly, and learn about the car. Learn each change, what does it do, what does what, what effect does everything have in the race-run. Even the brake-balance, which seems really tricky.

“It’s very specific with tyres and braking, it’s a bit different driving from all the single seaters, it’s hard. Those guys who’ve driven for three years know many of those specific things, how to use the tyres and so on. That’s definitely something I have to keep learning on.”

Looking ahead to his debut season in Formula E, Jani wants to be at the sharp end fighting for victories and hopes to stand on the rostrum in his maiden year.

“The aim must be always to win, otherwise you don’t need to come to a race weekend. Winning a race here is everything else than easy. There are so many things that decide a race in the end, for me is being fighting out there, fighting for podiums would be great.”