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Meet ‘baby-faced assassin’ Brit racing wonderkid and F1 hopeful who was branded ‘f***ing annoying little kid’ by rival
MANY upcoming drivers are billed as the next big motorsport talent.
But when you talk about Taylor Barnard, he already has the accolades to back up the hype.
Norfolk-born Barnard started racing in karting when he was just seven years old, and as far as the now 21-year-old is concerned that has basically been his whole life.
Indeed, speaking exclusively to SunSport, Barnard – who counts racing legend and three-time Formula One world champion Ayrton Senna as his icon – reckons racing currently takes up 97 per cent of his life.
That astronomical figure is actually down from 99 per cent, but new life experiences including moving out of his parents’ house and needing to do “grown up things” like house chores and personal admin has seen a small shift in his priorities.
Saying that, Barnard still spends a good chunk of that spare three per cent contributing to his racing career by spending time in the gym and simulator.
It is something which paid dividends for him as he took the Formula E field by storm during his rookie season with McLaren Neom as he finished fourth in the drivers championship.
Barnard, already the youngest driver in the series’ history, also became the youngest driver in Formula E history to score points, clinch a podium and get on pole in a stunning full debut year.
That’s not to say Barnard had an easy time of it, and he credits Oliver Rowland and McLaren team-mate Sam Bird for welcoming him to the grid early on, before his elbows-out racing showed he was far from a soft touch.
Barnard’s second season in Formula E – starting in Brazil on December 6 – comes with a move to Penske, where he hopes to apply the lessons he learned from his first season alongside new team-mate Maximilian Gunther.
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On the challenge, Barnard said: “I wouldn’t say there’s one particular thing that I learned last year.
“Obviously, I didn’t have any experience, so just taking all of the experience as a whole and being able to apply that to a second year in the championship will already be a massive help for me.
“In qualifying of course the duels are a weird concept that I’ve never experienced before in anything other than Formula E so to be able to take that experience into next year is going to help massively.
“The energy saving which is something that you never see anywhere else was something that I needed to experience and I can take that into next year.
“So there’s plenty of things that I could say I’m taking into next year. But I think generally, it’s just the experience.
“Of course Max (Gunther) is a bit younger, so I think in terms of how we connect, it is a bit better. Obviously Sam [Bird] was very established and he was a great driver, but Max won two races last year.
“We’ve only had one session on the track together, which was obviously Valencia, but I think as the season goes on and I get more comfortable with the new team, I will know better what I can ask him advice-wise.”
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Barnard’s relationship with another driver, Dan Ticktum, is highlighted in the second season of Formula E: Driver after Ticktum refers to the rookie as that “f***ing annoying little kid” after being beaten by Barnard in the qualifying duels in Jakarta.
However, Barnard believes his outspoken fellow Brit, who will drive for Cupra Kiro in 2025/26, gets a bad rep and is really a great guy and “actually very funny” in private off track.
Barnard said of the 26-year-old: “He’s obviously a great driver. We were fighting each other quite a lot on track last year and sometimes he got a bit close and we had a bit of a scuffle but I think that’s just how things go out on track.
“I’ve got nothing but respect for Dan and for every one of the drivers on the grid.”
Away from his Formula E car, Barnard also enjoys spending a lot of time on sim racing, even playing with Max Verstappen in the past.
Quickfire questions: Taylor Barnard
Favourite drink?
Water. I only drink still water. It’s not by choice it’s just because I don’t like anything else.
Favourite food or snack?
Enchiladas.
Guilty pleasure?
Dark chocolate. It’s newly found about last month. I’m still exploring at the minute, it has to be like 80 per cent because then it’s not too unhealthy. It’s actually got some positives to it which makes me feel a bit less guilty, but yeah dark chocolate at the minute for me.
Favourite track?
I love Mugello. Obviously I can’t drive there in Formula E but that track was very cool. Monaco has to be everyone’s favourite, that’s [in my] top three.
Favourite car?
Any F1 car from like the 2007 era, somewhere around that.
Four-time F1 world champion Verstappen translated his experience in sim racing into real life when he competed, and won, at the Nurburgring in December.
This is something Barnard admits he would like to echo in the future in races such as Le Mans or Daytona, but admitted “the dream” would be to win any of the Triple Crown, in particular F1’s Monaco Grand Prix.
The Triple Crown of motorsport – winning the F1 Monaco Grand Prix, 24 Hours Le Mans and Indianapolis 500 – has only been achieved by one driver, Graham Hill, who completed it back in 1972.
Barnard said: “That would be the dream of course, but that’s going to be quite difficult.
“I think that the Monaco Grand Prix is actually going to be the most difficult for me to get. That doesn’t take anything away from Le Mans or the Indy 500, but I’d like to get just one of the three if I’m honest.”
Clean-shaven Barnard jokes he’s “21 going on 16”, but that has not fooled the Formula E paddock from taking him lightly and he has quickly earned the nickname the “baby-faced assassin”.
However, while he doesn’t mind people giving him that tag, he admits he has personally never been a huge fan, believing nicknames feel “awkward”.
Regardless, Barnard believes his second full season in Formula E will be “business as usual”.
He explained: “For me it’s business as usual, but I think some people are going to be having a closer eye on me than perhaps they did last year.
“I think it was a bit of a surprise which was to my advantage. Of course all the drivers now know how I race, they know how I go about doing things which is obviously going to be more of a disadvantage for myself.
“But yeah, business as usual for me and I’m just going to keep working as hard as I can.”
All four episodes of Formula E: Driver are available to stream on Friday, 28 November, on Prime Video at no additional cost with a Prime membership.
