Simon Galloway/Getty Images
Barclay to depart Jaguar at the end of the Formula E season
JLR Motorsport managing director and Jaguar TCS Racing team principal James Barclay will leave the company following the conclusion of the current Formula E season, the company announced today.
Barclay will depart on August 1, moving to what JLR has described as “an exciting role outside our business”.
"JLR can confirm that James Barclay has decided to leave his role as Managing Director JLR Motorsport and Team Principal of Jaguar TCS Racing, effective from 01 August 2025, to pursue an exciting role outside our business,” JLR said in a statement. “James has been an integral member of the JLR leadership team since he joined the company in 2013.”
Barclay celebrates Jaguar's Season 10 Teams' Championship title. Jaguar Racing/Getty Images
Barclay first joined JLR in 2013 following 11-years at Bentley – being a part of the company as it won at Le Mans in 2003 – and a three year spell at Lotus in various marketing roles and ascended to the position of team director of Jaguar's Formula E team in November 2015 ahead of its debut in the 2016-17 season – a role that became team principal and managing director of JLR’s motorsport division in 2021.
“Among many significant accomplishments during his time at JLR, last year, James sensationally led Jaguar TCS Racing to Jaguar’s first world championship win since 1991,” the statement continued. “More recently, James has been instrumental in establishing the programme which will see Defender enter as a factory team into the Dakar Rally and FIA World Rally Raid Championship from 2026. James will continue in his current role leading the JLR Motorsport function until 01 August."
Under his leadership Jaguar has won 17 Formula E races and taken a further 30 podiums. It also took the 2023-24 Teams' championship – Jaguar's first world championship title since the 1991 World Sportscar Championship – while customer team Envision Racing was champion the year before. He also initiated JLR’s impending 2026 entry into the Dakar Rally and FIA World Rally Raid championship with the Defender brand.
Announcement of Barclay's departure comes a year after technical director Phil Charles – a former Renault and Toro Rosso Formula 1 race engineer – left the team for DS Penske. A replacement for Barclay has not been announced and isn’t expected to be for the foreseeable future.
Dominik Wilde
Dominik often jokes that he was born in the wrong country – a lover of NASCAR and IndyCar, he covered both in a past life as a junior at Autosport in the UK, but he’s spent most of his career to date covering the sliding and flying antics of the U.S.’ interpretation of rallycross. Rather fitting for a man that says he likes “seeing cars do what they’re not supposed to do”, previously worked for a car stunt show, and once even rolled a rally car with Travis Pastrana. He was also comprehensively beaten in a kart race by Sebastien Loeb once, but who hasn’t been?
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