At the recent Marrakesh round of the Formula E championship, actor Orlando Bloom was given the opportunity to drive one of the series’ electric open-wheel cars around the course solo. Bloom celebrated his 41st birthday by suiting up and strapping in. Unfortunately for him, it ended in rather humiliating fashion. In the wall.
In the full video below, you’ll see that Mr. Bloom was given a couple of laps worth of track sighting and instruction in the BMW i8 course car with championship-leader-at-the-time Sam Bird before being let loose in the real race car. You’ll recall a similar training method was employed when Stef Schrader stepped behind the wheel of a Formula E car last summer.
It would seem that Bloom got a bit overzealous with the throttle coming out of a tight corner, and the Spark-Renault SRT_01E’s instant-on electric power delivery and low-grip treaded tires caught him off guard. The car slid wide into a drift that ended with the nose cone in the wall.
Luckily for all involved, the damage was minor, nobody was hurt, and the actor even got the broken nosecone as souvenir to remember his momentary shame forever.