Australia's next F1 star heads to Europe?

Words: Steve Kealy

Watch out for the name Patrizi. Michael Patrizi.

The 21-year old Western Australian has just been awarded the first fully-funded works-backed drive ever made, in the Formula BMW series in the UK.

The series, using identical cars in separate championships run in Asia, Germany, UK and the US, is considered a line-of-sight stepping-stone to Formula One – and Patrizi’s well along the path.

Patrizi’s works-backed drive announcement was made by Dr Mario Theisen, BMW’s Director of Motorsport, at the company’s end-of-year party at Seefeld in Austria. The celebration was attended by luminaries from BMW’s global motorsporting effort, including F1 team chief Sir Frank Williams, World Touring Car champion Andy Prialux and WTCC racer, Alex Zanardi.

Motorsport in the UK is regarded as the premier training-ground for future world champions -- virtually every current and past top-flight driver has served at least part of their apprenticeship in British racing; this includes Australian Mark Webber, facing 2006 at Williams with Patrizi’s friend, Nico Rosberg, as his teammate in the young German-born Finn's maiden F1 season.

Patrizi’s sponsored UK drive for 2006 comes on the back of a US$50,000 scholarship to race the entire Formula BMW Asia series in 2005. Contesting 14 rounds, Michael finished the series in second place and as top Rookie, 15 points adrift – having lost 20 points for a minor start-line infringement in China.

Never qualifying lower than seventh, Patrizi scored two wins, plus the one where a 30sec penalty gave him an eighth, his worst finish all year.

Formula BMW is the leading open-wheeled racing series across Asia, and has rounds in China, Korea, Japan, Thailand, Malaysia and Bahrain. Yet the $50,000 scholarship constituted about a third of the cost of being competitive in the Asian series, so the fully-funded drive represents a major step up the ladder for the talented Gidgegannup (WA) resident.

Speaking of his 2005 year with the top-flight Meritus racing team, who have won virtually everything there is to win in Asian Motorsport, Michael suggested that he learned as much in a single year as he would in five years at university -– although finding the extra cash was a real struggle.

Prior to his 2005 scholarship, Michael was a WA karting champion in 2002 and set a new lap record at the Japanese Suzuka circuit, eclipsing the time set by F1 driver, Giancarlo Fisichella.

Patrizi was the official driver for the Birel Kart team based in Italy in 2003 and contested the NSW and Victorian State Formula Ford titles in 2004. During ’05, he was the first Australian selected to Team Australia’s junior development program, debuting that team’s Formula BMW USA operation at the Champ Car event in Denver, Colorado, where he qualified and finished fifth on debut.

Formula BMW is a one-make series using identical Mygale open-wheeled chassis, powered by BMW engines more normally seen in the brand’s K1200 RS motorcycles and mated to Hewland six-speed sequential gearboxes. The cars have full data-logging systems and much of the chassis and aerodynamic tuneability found on bigger-hearted single-seater cars.

BMW’s involvement in the championships extends much further than merely as a sponsor -– drivers receive coaching and attend seminars on fitness and nutrition, vehicle dynamics and chassis set-up, media training and public relations, sponsorship and sports management.

Patrizi will relocate to Rochester in Kent in February, ahead of the British championship which kicks off at the historic Brands Hatch circuit in April.

Asked whether a F1 test drive was on his horizon, he replied, “I hope so – but I’m not thinking about too many big things right now.”