Button: FFord and F3 Hamilton: Renault, F3, GP2 Raikkonen: FFord, FRenault Alonso: Dallara Nissan, F3000 Schumacher: FFord, F3, F3000 & Sportscars Hakkinen: FFord, F3 Villeneuve: F3, Atlantic, Indycar Hill: FFord, F3, F3000 Prost: FRenault, F3 Mansell: FFord, F3 Senna: FFord, FF2000, F3 Piquet: Formula Super Vee, Formula Vee, F3 Lauda: Formula Vee, F2 Rosberg: Formula Vee, Atlantic, F2 Jones: F3
I think it's pretty clear that if you want to be an F1 driver, your best bet is to do well in F3. FFord is popular, FRenault has some scope and Formula Vee gets a mention but that is mainly owing to its prior dominance in Central Europe. The F2 mentioned here was the precursor to GP2/F3000 and was a multimake class, not the spec class we have today.
Just one Palmer Audi chapmion has graduated to a full-time F1 seat and that was Justin Wilson in the innaugral season. Interestingly, in that season double Formula Jedi champion James Pickford finished near last. A season of Formula Palmer Audi is £70,000. You can run competitively in British FFord with one race engineer and a mechanic for less than that, but people buy into the hype of big teams with flashy trucks; as can now be seen in karting.
Dave
|
|