Formula One does not currently have a race on their annual calendar in Africa, making it the only continent that is not represented in motor-sport’s flagship competition. This is set to change in the next few years, if the efforts to bring the Cape Town Grand Prix to life come to fruition.
Located at the very bottom tip of the continent, South Africa’s second largest city of Cape Town, which hosted the FIFA World Cup in 2010 is the optimal place for such a high end sport to be hosted due to its well developed infrastructure and a laid back lifestyle that attracts millions of tourists every year.
This will, however, not be the first time for the country to host F1 races. Johannesburg, the country’s commercial capital hosted races in 1967-80, 1982-85 and 1992-93 (which Williams’ Alain Prost won), before F1 took a long hiatus from the continent.
Cape Town Grand Prix bid chief executive, Igshaan Amlay, told AFKSports in an email interview that they are already working towards conducting environmental and financial impact assessments as well as stakeholder engagements to make sure the proper ground work is laid for the annual competion.
” We still have a long road ahead of us,” Amlay said. “To be realistic we can look at 2017/2018 should we get the necessary buy-in from all important stakeholders.”
His company is working hard to bring an F1 race back to South African shores, and they are targeting the Mother City as the ideal race track host.
An incredible street track that envisions F1 cars hurtling around the Green point Sports Precinct and countless fans from around the world flocking Cape Town streets to follow the cars and drivers has been proposed.
But Cape Town hosting the event did not come without some stiff competition from other developed cities on the continent, Amlay said.
“There has been talk of countries like Morocco and Nigeria looking at the feasibility of hosting this prestigious event, however, Cape Town has been rated as one of the top destinations in the world, and what better place than having it on our very own ‘African Riviera’,” adding that Cape Town had one of the biggest motor sports following in Africa and it was a “no brainer” that the city was chosen to host the race.
Bringing the Grand Prix t0 South Africa, Amlay said, will boost the country’s economy as well as attract a new profile of visitors to the country. South Africa gets nearly 15 million tourists every year. The sector supports 1.4-million direct and indirect jobs and contributes 9.5 percent of South Africa’s total Gross Domestic Product.
“The Formula One Grand Prix has a global following of 50 000+ spectators who buy tickets to every race and travel with them. That is aside from your average follower,” Amlay told AFKSports.
To underscore the interest in building a F1 Grand Prix in Cape Town, Amlay said thay had already got an investor who is ready to fund the who project “from start to finish”. He, however, did not say how much the investor was willing to sink into the racing track.
“Currently we are busy with stakeholder engagement and have received the desired support from the ratepayers within the area. We have been approached by investors with serious interest and are currently engaging with a potential investor who is prepared to fund from start to finish.”
In the past there have however been some resistance by local authorities to allow F1 racing back into Cape town.
“We are not in favour of it because of the huge cost implications to the city.” Cape tourism’s events and marketing director Anton Groenewald was quoted by Wheels24 saying in 2013, while councillor Felicity Purchase said the stadium was not “available for racing”, adding that they were not ready to “subject residents in the area to the noise of racing.”
Amly told AFKSports that his company was still pursuing the City of Cape Town and Provincial Government and expected them to come on board “in due course.” The bid has also got support from the F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone.
“We’re in the middle of trying to do something in South Africa,” Ecclestone told Russian agency R-Sport. “We used to have a race there and it would be nice to get back there again, to that part of the world.”
