Pascal Wehrlein clinched the Formula E Championship with Porsche at the end of the 2023-24 season after taking a unique route to the title.
The German won the Formula E championship after his fourth season in the series and a long journey to recover his career after a difficult run at the back of the field in Formula 1.
Wehrlein began his career on the junior ladder below F1, winning the ADAC Formel Masters in 2011 and finishing fourth at the Macau Grand Prix a year later.
He continued in single-seaters full-time until the end of 2012, then switched to the DTM for the following season and won the championship in 2015.
How Pascal Wehrlein went from winning the DTM title to taking the Formula E championship
In 2012, the FIA Formula 3 European Championship was challenging for the German. Wehrlein finished fourth and failed to challenge the eventual champion, Daniel Juncadella.
He left single-seater racing at the end of the season as the dream of Formula 1 was temporarily put on hold as he pushed for a career in touring cars.
As he acclimatised to the very different driving style and atmosphere around the DTM he drove for Mucke Motorsport for two years, the same outfit he competed with in Formula 3.
Wehrlein didn’t challenge for the title initially but scored a breakthrough victory in 2014 at the Lausitzring. He also got his foot in the door at Mercedes in Formula 1, becoming their reserve driver.
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The DTM championship followed in 2015 as he completed productive testing for the Mercedes-powered Force India team in Formula 1 at the Red Bull Ring.
Manor, another team that enjoyed the benefit of Mercedes engines, then had two vacancies ahead of the following year and the German was chosen to drive alongside Rio Haryanto.
A forgettable year ended at Manor before an unsuccessful switch to Sauber for 2017 before he returned to the DTM for 2018.
Wehrlein was much more comfortable in touring cars once more but moved to Formula E after one season and developed into a title contender before winning the championship with Porsche.
Why didn’t Pascal Wehrlein spend more than two years in Formula 1?
Wehrlein being a young German driver with a proven record of winning at a high level and boasting links to a leading German Formula 1 team in Mercedes all sounded promising.
But despite the optimism surrounding Wehrlein’s move to F1, he only stayed at the highest level of motorsport for two years before returning to the DTM.
Wehrlein struggled to hit the headlines in underfunded cars rooted to the back of the field. The only notable race of his debut season was the 2016 Austrian Grand Prix, where he drove to 10th place on a chaotic day.
A year later, at Sauber alongside Marcus Ericsson, the story was similar. An injury sustained in pre-season curtailed his schedule ahead of the season-opener in Australia.
Wehrlein scored points on just three occasions with his best result coming at the Spanish Grand Prix with an eighth place.
The German was replaced by the 2017 Formula 2 champion Charles Leclerc for 2018 and Wehrlein’s chance at Formula 1 had disappeared.