15/01/2008
NEWS STORY
Motorsport royalty Emerson Fittipaldi is among the high-flyers of the sporting and celebrity set preparing to flood Taupo this week for the 2008 New Zealand round of the A1GP World Cup of Motorsport.
Fittipaldi, who owns A1 Team Brazil, is the only driver to have won two Formula One world championships, two Indianapolis 500's and an Indy Car title. He was aged just 25 when he won the first of his Formula One titles, at the time the youngest-ever world champion.
A sporting hero in his native Brazil, he is now a massive believer in the nation on nation A1GP series. Since ending his competitive motor-racing career in 1996, Fittipaldi has dedicated much of his time to a successful business career. He believes the inaugural New Zealand round of the A1GP circuit was one of the best he had seen from a business point of view.
"New Zealand is showing how successful A1GP can be world-wide with the promotion, the publicity, the organisation and the track," Fittipaldi said. "A1GP New Zealand succeeded in making a very big event."
Fittipaldi has been on deck with the A1GP circuit since its beginnings in late 2005. And he revealed it took little selling for him to be converted to the nation versus nation series. "I am very happy with this new concept in motorsport," he said. "I met Tony Teixeira in South Africa three years ago. He told me the concept and I said, 'I want in'. And I am very happy to be involved. It is very close racing. It is nation against nation - the concept is great.
"Formula One will always be Formula One," he continued. "But then there is a big gap internationally - there is no other category internationally that goes to different countries like we go. A1GP provides the racing fans with the excitement of patriotic fervour. That is something that other races don't have. That is the incredible potential that A1GP has."
Fittipaldi is one of a host of big-name and influential sporting and business identities who are a seat holder at an A1GP team. The Australian challenge is headed by former Formula One world champion Alan Jones. A1 Team China is run by oil magnate Liu Yu. Gastronomic entrepreneur Willi Weber - also a member of the board of trustees of UNESCO's Education for Children in Need organisation - heads the German team. South African seat holder Tokyo Sexwale, a one-time former prisoner along with Nelson Mandela at Robben Island, has carved out a successful career in mining and energy. And A1 Team.NZL is run by one of New Zealand's most successful businessmen, Colin Giltrap.
During his visit to Taupo last year, Fittipaldi was on hand at the announcement of the development of a movie honouring the life and times of New Zealand motorsport legend Bruce McLaren. He also took time out to entertain the crowd by completing a series of exhibition hot-laps on the TMP circuit in a McLaren once raced by Denny Hulme.
"Bruce McLaren contributed so much to motorsport worldwide and to me is special," said the Brazilian. "I won one of my world championships with McLaren. And when I joined McLaren, still 90 percent of the people there were New Zealanders.
"I learnt a lot with McLaren. It was an incredible organisation and Bruce built up a name in motorsport that will stay forever. What was so different and special about him was his commitment to technology, how to improve the cars and his people as a team. To win a race, you have to have all the ingredients - it is difficult to put everything together.
"But when I joined McLaren, while Bruce wasn't there, the culture of Bruce was there. There was full commitment of the people to him. I was happy in that type of environment. People wanted to win, succeed and work well together. To me, it was one of the best teams I ever worked with in my career."