Formula Elite (Ajax)

Formula Elite

Category	Open-wheel racing
Region	International
Drivers' champion	Hun Hunapu

Formula Elite (FE) is an international open-wheel racing motorsports championship. It is the highest-level competition sanctioned by the World Automotive Sports Union and is widely considered among the world's premier racing series. Racers are challenged with as many as 20 events across six continents.

FE is a single-championship series: that there is no separate championship for drivers and teams. Teams ultimately exist to support their drivers; whose placings in the final rankings determine the teams' prize awards at the end of a season. The entry barrier to the sport is extremely high, with travel costs, manufacturing capabilities, and high talent standards While a number of privateer racing teams continue to participate, subsisting off of their prize money every year, the majority of drivers and teams rely on corporate or national sponsorships to operate. In addition, drivers must first qualify for a World Automotive Sports Union champion's license by achieving a threshold number of points in feeder disciplines in order to be eligible for the FE series.

History

Formula Elite was founded in 1980 as a project of the World Automotive Sports Union (WASU). WASU is an organization that was formed to regulate motorsports series in the wake of the 1962 Chueco Endurance Race disaster which resulted in the fatalities of two drivers and 80 spectators along with serious injuries to 116 others. In the years and decades that followed the disaster, WASU's sanctioning authority expanded over various series and driving formulas worldwide, gathering broad recognition as the preeminent motorsports regulator.

1980 FE series open-wheel circuit racecar

In 1975, the then-president of WASU, Yunus Emre, proposed the formation of an ultimate open-wheel championship series drawing from the top level of competition from the various disciplines under the sanction of WASU. The initial proposal of what would eventually become FE was less a series and a system of assigning points for existing races run under different formulas. Significant changes were brought about as the concept was developed, particularly with an eye toward profitability and sustainability which drove the decisions to expand the event from effectively an independent scoring system into a full series and to introduce a new formula, intended to create the fastest possible cars within reasonable safety parameters.

On February 4, 1977, Formula Elite was publically unveiled with the inaugural season set to begin in March 1979. The announcement was not received enthusiastically by all parties, however. Other formula racing series launched a legal challenge against WASU, arguing that the regulatory body had breached a duty of care toward the regional series by entering into direct competition with them. The court battle delayed the inaugural season by a year to 1980 but was ultimately settled. Most of the terms of the settlement remain undisclosed, but several alterations to the FE series were conceded, including the requirement to obtain points in feeder series for eligibility to participate in FE.

Current season

Drivers

Driver	Abbr.	##	Origin
Franchesca Africani	AFR	44
Hun Hunapu	HUN	33
Kai Ludwig	LUD	77
Kimi Hisakawa	KIM	37
Puso Ramotswe	RAM	69
Geb Teklemariami	TEK	80
Āpirana Tipene	TIP	95
Zira Yufitarin	YUF	20