CAR COLUMN

Formula One Olympic Gold: could it happen?

Once again the Olympics have showcased the superhuman drive that propels an elite few to achieve sporting greatness. It's a quality shared with F1 drivers, who have been known to cross the divide in search of the ultimate medal. But what prevents F1 being formally woven into the Olympic tapestry?

Top of the menu on Rolls Royce’s website during my research into inspirational individuals in motorsport was a tab denoted ‘inspiring greatness’, which took me to a series of videos spotlighting exceptional people who have distinguished themselves in their chosen craft. The automaker has always been synonymous with excellence, but the message was that commitment, persistence and a desire to challenge the impossible are critical in all walks of life, including motor manufacturing, the arts, charity and sport.

Developing this line of thought there can be few sportspeople more inspirational than Italian motor racing driver Alex Zanardi, whose career skyrocketed in the 1990s, culminating in fifteen wins and two titles in the Champ Car World Series and more than forty Formula One appearances for the Jordan, Minardi, Lotus and Williams teams.

By the 2000 season Zanardi had made a comeback in Champ, only for tragedy to strike at the American Memorial race at The Lausitzring, when his car was blindsided by another driver at 200mph as he left the pits, ripping it in two. He lost of both legs and almost three quarters of his entire blood volume.

Not only did Zanardi survive the accident, in 2003 he made a remarkable return first to motor racing, and later the European Touring Car championship, in a car adapted with hand operated brake and accelerator controls, before retiring from racing in 2009.

Not content to rest on his laurels, however, he took up handcycling, achieving fourth place in its division at the New York City marathon that same year. By 2011 he was first across the line in the Big Apple, a feat later mirrored at both the Rome and Venice

equivalents. He went on to take four gold and two silver Paralympic medals at the London 2012 and Rio 2016 games, across cycling road time trials, individual races and mixed team relays, in addition to being named the outstanding male athlete at the former. His final transition was to triathlon, where he obliterated the world record in the Ironman disabled category in 2018.

Whilst Zanardi retains the distinction of being F1's only Paralympic gold medal winner, there have been other notable F1 Olympians. A good example is Divina Galica MBE, who having taken up motor sport as a second career after captaining the British Women’s Olympic Ski team in 1968 and 1972, resurfaced in the 1992 Winter Olympics to represent GB in the alpine speed skiing event. The following year she joined a select group of women to have broken the 200 km/h barrier.

There have long been whispers around whether F1 might be added to the programme for the 2028 games in Los Angeles, given the obvious desire to grow the sport in the USA, but despite making the long list that went before the International Olympic Committee and five new sports being given the green light - namely baseball/softball, cricket, squash, flag football and lacrosse – F1 failed to make the cut.

The principal reason for this appears to be the difficulty of achieving a level playing field for competitors in the Olympic setting, largely due to the current championship set up, but also the politics which surrounds it.

For those not familiar with the sport, in a Formula One season, two world championships effectively run side by side, the first a competition between the

drivers and the second a competition between the racing car constructors.

In the Drivers’ Championship, which best captures the imagination of the public and consumes most of the media attention, the individual F1 driver with the most championship points at the end of the season becomes the world champion.

The title that F1 teams such as McLaren and Red Bull fight over is the FIA Formula One World Championship for Constructors – a battle between the corporate entities who design key elements of F1 cars – the winner being the team with the most championship points at the end of the season.

For F1 to be admitted as an Olympic sport, focus would need to shift away from constructors and team resources, which are notoriously uneven, including the work undertaken by their army of engineers and mechanics, in favour of driver skill, the standardisation of racing cars and more inclusive representation for drivers from the other Formulas. Unsurprisingly many in the industry are not in favour of such an approach.

Suffice it to say and sadly, the only cars you're likely to see in the City of Angels during the 2028 Olympics are the ones stuck nose to tail on the freeway, in the infamous LA traffic, but this takes nothing away from the Herculean accomplishments of Zanardi, Galica and those others who have firmly planted a foot in both sporting camps. 

Joel Leigh is the motoring correspondent of City Solicitor and a Partner at Howard Kennedy LLP