France and Formula 1

France could be set to get itself back into top line motor racing and to the days of French domination of Formula 1 - when Jean-Pierre Beltoise and Francois Cevert gave a touch of flamboyance; when Jacques Laffite, Patrick Depailler, Patrick Tambay, Rene Arnoux and Didier Pironi racing in the same era made it a French-saturated Formula 1 grid in the late '70s; and when Alain Prost used his brawn to counter British and Brazilian aggression to win three Formula 1 World Drivers’ Championships and added a fourth one in his last season, triumphing over much younger opposition after negotiating, with a businessman’s acumen, a landmark deal to race with the dominant Williams squad following a sabbatical year. Indeed Prost has won races with four top F1 teams - Renault, McLaren, Ferrari and Williams – not a fete many drivers can boast of.

Jean Alesi, Olivier Panis and Sebastien Bourdais

But since then, France's representation in Formula 1 has been stagnant. The promising Jean Alesi couldn’t achieve much and Olivier Panis has a sole victory at the dramatic 1997 Monaco Grand Prix to boast of. Rising talents such as Jonathan Cochet, Alexandre Premat and Nicolas Lapierre have somehow failed to become part of the F1 fraternity, while Sebastien Bourdais, after four dominant championship-winning seasons in the America’s erstwhile Champ Car World Series, was forced to make way for Swiss driver Sebastien Buemi at Red Bull Racing F1 team's sister outfit, Scuderia Toro Rosso.

France Loses its Formula 1 Race

To complete the embarrassment, France has fallen prey to F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone’s rising race staging fees and has lost its annual F1 race as well, the French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours in the Nevers region. Alain Prost aptly described France as becoming “auto-phobic,” too polite a term for a country which, plagued by rising pressure from environmentalists, doesn’t care about nurturing the rich tradition of Grand Prix racing it had once played a significant role in cultivating. Fortunately, the Le Mans 24 Hours race, the massive participation in the annual Dakar rally raid, and the presence of the eagerly sought after and high-tech Paul Ricard circuit still put France somewhere in the motor racing radar, though it is a poor shadow of its former glory.

Renault, Prost and Ligier F1 Teams

French teams could have brought back the fervor, but Alain Prost’s team fell on its face and its assets were liquidated in 2002, while its predecessor the Ligier outfit never tasted lasting success. Renault has been highly successful, but following Fernando Alonso’s double Formula 1 World Championship-winning exploits for the team in 2005 and 2006, the team has yet to get back to winning ways consistently.

Moreover, the modern iteration of the Renault Formula 1 team has never been a fully French effort, with the team run by Italian Flavio Briatore and the chassis built by the team’s core personnel at Enstone in England. Only the engine came from Viry-Chatillon near Paris and the money too. But now, even that has been lost with Renault selling the shares of its team to Luxembourg-based investment firm Genii Capital in 2009 and then more comprehensively in 2010. Genii Capital has now sold a large part of its shares to Group Lotus for the team to be re-branded as Lotus Renault Grand Prix in 2011. Renault will continue only as an engine maker, a position in which it has tasted the greatest success, with Lotus and Williams in the late '80s and early '90s, and with Red Bull in 2010.

New F1 Drivers From France Likely

But nothing will stir up passion for a sport than participation from an athlete from the nation. The sudden increase in popularity of F1 in Spain following Fernando Alonso’s success is a case in point. And France could be having its own hero soon, thanks to rise of two fast, intelligent and naturally talented racing drivers coming up the ranks of GP2 and the World Series by Renault – Jules Bianchi from Nice and Jean-Eric Vergne from Paris. Both have strong financial backing.

Jules Bianchi

Jules Bianchi was taken under Ferrari’s wing by the end of 2009 and was recently announced Scuderia Ferrari’s official F1 test driver for 2011. After finishing 3rd in the 2010 GP2 Series despite a serious injury, Bianchi, the 2009 F3 Euro Series Champion, is continuing in GP2 this year with ART, now called Lotus ART after the tie-up with Group Lotus. Bianchi thus has a shot at a Formula 1 drive in the next couple of years either with Ferrari or with Lotus Renault.

Jean-Eric Vergne

Reigning British F3 Champion Jean-Eric Vergne is under the Red Bull umbrella. 2008 British F3 Champion and Red Bull Young Driver member Jaime Alguersuari had a quick initiation into F1 following his F3 title, and with Jean-Eric Vergne appointed as Toro Rosso’s test driver for 2011, the F1 call is surely around the corner.

One or both of these could become World Champions in the future and this is just what France needs to put those environmentalists to rest and get started in getting back to active Formula 1 participation. The revival of the Pau Grand Prix Formula 3 event proves that all is not lost yet for France.