A company based out of the Virgin Islands created a stock car series in which former Formula One drivers dueled one another on some of the world’s, erm, wealthiest race tracks. The series lasted two seasons before collapsing.
If this sounds like a weird scam that someone from Nigeria is trying to get you to invest in, it’s surprisingly not. This series existed, and it was called the Speedcar Series.
Speedcar was founded by Benoit Lamonerie, a French promoter and entrepreneur, in 2007. A stock car lover (and fan of bad ideas), Lamonerie decided the Middle East lacked American-esque horsepower, and successfully convinced both the Dubai-based Union Properties to fund the series and several American investors to contribute equipment. The cars were one-ton stock V8s, referred to as Speedcar V8s but greatly resembling a Gen 4 Chevrolet Impala, built by Bob Schacht Motorsports.
The series was penciled to start at the Dubai Autodrome for an event in January, followed by the second race at Sentul, in Indonesia, in February. The series would then head to Sepang, Malaysia in March, and in April would run at Bahrain and Dubai. Each round would consist of two races, each race lasting 100km or 45 minutes. Unfortunately, not all the cars were ready to go for Dubai, so the opener was declared a non-championship event.
The series was perhaps best known for its drivers. A plethora of former Formula One drivers secured their window nets at some point in the first season, including Johnny Herbert, Jean Alesi, Ukyo Katayama, and Jacques Villeneuve. Herbert, in fact, won the title that year, tying David Terrien on points but securing the championship on wins. Other names included Moreno Soeprapto, who famously survived a horrific Formula Three crash at Sentul in 2006, and DTM beast Klaus Ludwig.
The second season, which took place across the northern hemisphere’s winter in 2008 and 2009, started off with an interesting event at the Dubai opener. A collision with Marchy Lee and Marcel Tiemann managed to upend Stefan Johannson’s entry, and a major desert flood washed out the second race in the doubleheaders.
Unlike the prior season, the second season remained in the Middle East. The finale was highlighted by a humorously large jump-start performed by Jean Alesi Gianni Morbidelli brought home the second season by two points over Johnny Herbert. This, unfortunately, would be it for Speedcar, which quickly became a victim of the worldwide economic downturn in 2009. New series boss Claudio Berro made an attempt to save the series, but in June, it was announced that Speedcar was done for.
Overall, Speedcar was an interesting experiment for the short time it lasted. The sight of Jean Alesi and Johnny Herbert was certainly strange, but unfortunately, the series simply didn’t last. Asia is still looking for a NASCAR-style stock car series today, as a second experiment, the Asian V8 Championship, failed in 2014. However, with Thailand home to a TA2 class and stock cars still huge in Australia, anything is possible…
Sources:
“Stock Cars In The Sand: Speedcar Prepares To Launch NASCAR-Style Competition” – Autoweek, Jan. 30, 2008
“Speedcar Series goes pop as financial bubble bursts” – Crash.net, June 30, 2009
Speedcar’s website
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