Three a long time after the final Formula One engines roared on African soil, South Africa is vying to host a brand new Grand Prix and convey the world championship again to the continent.
The race for the distinguished occasion is down to 2 contenders: a road circuit in Cape Town and the historic, although much less scenic, Kyalami racetrack close to Johannesburg.
A committee fashioned by Sports Minister Gayton McKenzie will determine which bid wins within the third quarter of the yr, in line with committee member Mlimandlela Ndamase.
McKenzie stays optimistic about South Africa’s prospects.
“The Grand Prix is definitely coming in 2027, no doubt about that,” he stated in early February.
“Whether it is Cape Town or Joburg, we do not care as long as the Grand Prix is coming to South Africa.”
The difficult Kyalami circuit – which winds about 30 kilometers (20 miles) outdoors Johannesburg, with the monitor painted with an enormous, colourful South African flag – as soon as hosted nail-biting races and legendary drivers.
But the final Grand Prix on African soil was held in 1993, the yr earlier than South Africa’s first democratic elections that ended apartheid. It was gained by Alain Prost in a Williams.
Post-apartheid return?
South Africa’s bid to host F1 can depend on the assist of seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, who has lengthy advocated for an African Grand Prix.
“We can’t be adding races in other locations and continuing to ignore Africa,” Hamilton stated final August.
Under the management of U.S. conglomerate Liberty Media, which purchased the Formula One Group in 2017, the game desires to “go to every continent,” stated knowledgeable Samuel Tickell of the University of Münster in Germany.
Returning to South Africa can be “something very important for Formula 1, which has not raced there since the end of the apartheid era,” he advised Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The sport had some “historic moments” within the nation, Tickell stated, together with a threatened strike led by Niki Lauda in 1982 in opposition to a racing “super-licence” proscribing drivers’ contractual freedom.
South Africa additionally boasts the continent’s solely world champion, Ferrari’s Jody Scheckter, in 1979.
Creating a race on the continent wouldn’t require excluding different venues, because the F1 calendar is all the time increasing. The upcoming season will function seven extra Grand Prix than in 2009, for instance.
Sky-high organizational prices and internet hosting charges wouldn’t be an impediment, stated Simon Chadwick, professor of sport and geopolitical economics at Skema Business School in Paris.
“Even if races are not commercially viable, to some of the countries and their backers, that won’t matter because it’s a strategic payoff,” he stated.
China, for example, has “long been building sports infrastructure for African countries in return for access to their natural resources,” he stated.
Johannesburg’s Kyalami racetrack is licensed as Grade 2, only one stage under that wanted for an F1 race, and it’ll require some work to host an occasion.
Rwanda ‘in pole place’
An different circuit vying to host the distinguished race would wind by the streets of Cape Town, just lately ranked “best city in the world” by Time Out journal.
Winding its approach across the stadium constructed for the 2010 males’s soccer World Cup, within the shadow of the emblematic Lion’s Head mountain overlooking the ocean, the route hosted a Formula E race in 2023.
A Formula 1 road circuit within the metropolis would “outclass Monaco,” stated Cape Town Grand Prix CEO Igshaan Amlay.
Yet the actual battle could also be much less between the 2 rival cities than in opposition to Rwanda, whose President Paul Kagame attended the Singapore Grand Prix in September to fulfill the game’s governing physique, the FIA, and F1 homeowners Liberty Media, Chadwick stated.
The central African nation already sponsors Arsenal and Paris Saint-Germain soccer giants and is a accomplice of the NBA.
“Rwanda is in pole position,” Chadwick stated.
Morocco has additionally lengthy had ambitions of internet hosting an F1 race.
Still, nothing prevents two Grand Prix from being held on the continent, with the South African sports activities minister asking: “Why is it that when it comes to Africa, we are treated like we can only get one?”
Rwanda’s F1 bid may, nonetheless, be hampered by its involvement within the battle within the jap Democratic Republic of Congo.
Calls are already mounting to withdraw the biking Road World Championships, deliberate in Kigali in September.
Source: www.dailysabah.com