MOTORSPORT: Teen star faces biggest test
Australian Formula Ford Championship leader Anton de Pasquale takes on best regional talent in a race for a place in the FIA Institute Young Driver Excellence AcademyThe Year 12 student leading the Australian Formula Ford Championship is to be the country’s representative in an Asia-Pacific motor racing talent quest.
Anton de Pasquale, of Werribee on Melbourne’s south-western outskirts, could come up against as many as 18 others in competition for a place in the FIA Institute Young Driver Excellence Academy.
The Asia-Pacific selection trials will be held at Sydney Motorsport Park – still Eastern Creek to many – on October 20-23.
Mazda will provide MX-5 coupes and Mazda3 sedans for the event, and similar selection trials will be held in four other regions of the world.
The winners from all five regions as well as three wildcards will go to the annual “Academy” run by the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) – the world governing body of motorsport.
There they will be “schooled” by Alex Wurz, the Austrian ex-Formula One driver and podium placegetter who has won the Le Mans 24-Hour sports car classic twice, and Robert Reid, a Scotsman who was the co-driver to late world rally champion Richard Burns.
The young drivers at the selection trials will have to show more than form on the track – they also will be assessed on fitness, teamwork skills and media presentation.
“Hopefully I can make the most of it,” said De Pasquale, who only turned 18 two weeks ago. “I am sure to find out where I am at.”
De Pasquale has won four of 13 national Formula Ford races this season and two of four rounds. He won all three races at the most recent round at Winton, where the Formula Fords were on the support card to the V8 Supercars in late August.
Driving a Mygale car for the Sonic team, he took pole position there by a whopping 0.7 seconds and turned a 21-point deficit on the championship points table into an eight-point lead, 189-181, over Macauley Jones, who also drives a Mygale and is the son of V8 Supercar team owner Brad Jones.
Three rounds of the Formula Ford championship remain – at the Gold Coast 600, Victoria’s Phillip Island and the Sydney 500, all V8 Supercar events.
De Pasquale has a 25 per cent race-winning strike rate in the two years he has been racing in the category – initially in the Victorian championship - after winning a national karting title in 2011.
Drivers of various nationalities chosen for the Sydney Motorsport Park selection trial will be aged between 17 and 23. It will be run by CAMS, the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport, whose president Andrew Papadopoulos said it was “of the utmost importance that we give talented young drivers every chance possible, not just in Australia but all over the world, to fulfill their potential”.
“This global effort by the FIA Institute is to be applauded and embraced,” Papadopoulos said.
Mazda Australia managing director Martin Benders said the company “has a long history in Australian motorsport” and was “excited to team up with CAMS to help find, assist and develop motor racing’s next generation”.
“Anton De Pasquale is an exciting prospect and we wish him all the best as he competes against the best in the Asia-Pacific region,” Benders said.
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