The Formula 3 race – the jewel in the crown of Macao’s most famous sporting event – is being replaced with a regional junior competition, the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) has announced.
In a statement yesterday, global motorsport’s governing body said that the Formula Regional competition would “co-headline” the 71st Macau Grand Prix along with the GT3 race.
Formula Regional was launched six years ago, the FIA says, to “bridge the gap between various national Formula 4 series and the global FIA Formula 3 Championship.” It is a junior single-seater event, currently being held in five different series around the world.
[See more: Guangzhou looks set to get its own Formula 1 racetrack]
According to the FIA, the move is intended to make the Macau Grand Prix “more accessible than ever, opening it up to a broad pool of potential drivers competing at regional level.”
Formula 3 races have been part of the Macau Grand Prix for decades, and have been won by such icons of motorsport as Brazil’s Ayrton Senna and Germany’s Michael Schumacher.
In spite of that, François Sicard, the FIA’s single-seater strategy and operations director said the switch to Formula Regional was the “optimal long-term solution for the FIA-sanctioned single-seater competition in Macau.”
