Former boss of the BAR team, Craig Pollock recently unveiled a new training project committed to Formula 1 with the ambition of having a staff respecting total parity between men and women.
Formula 1 continues to be attractive. While the Andretti family was the first to report their desire to join the discipline, Hong Kong-based billionaire Calvin Lo also said he wanted to set up his own training. Initiatives which have thus prompted the International Automobile Federation (FIA) to formally launch a call for tenders for one or more teams by 2026, to which formations such as Hitech, currently engaged in Formula 2 and Formula 3, but also Panthera wish to respond. It is now possible to add to this list of candidates a project based in the Middle East and led by a former figure in the paddock, Craig Pollock.
Founder of the BAR team in 1999, now known as Mercedes after having taken the name of Honda then that of Brawn GP, the former manager of Jacques Villeneuve presented in an interview with the American channel CNN a project called Formula Equal. On this occasion, Craig Pollock confirmed that “it has been almost four years” that he has been working on such a project with one key principle at its core: “to provide women with opportunities and access routes to the highest in motorsports.
For the past four years, Craig Pollock has been secretly laying the groundwork for a new Formula One team unlike any other already on the paddock https://t.co/3hjWyqtm3a
— CNN (@CNN) March 28, 2023
Pollock establishes parity as a basic principle
While the W Series championship launched in 2019 allowed female drivers to have better exposure, F1 will launch its “Academy” championship this year to consolidate this desire to open the door to women. For the Formula Equal project, the ambition is much greater. “The concept and the idea was to try to build a Formula 1 team made up of 50% men and 50% women, which is extremely difficult to do with an existing team, assured Craig Pollock. It’s much easier starting from a blank sheet. »
However, when asked about the possibility of having a duo of pilots respecting this principle, the former leader of BAR cannot promise to go that far even if “it would be fantastic” and that he “is following it closely”. “It’s not just about women drivers in Formula 1. It’s about the whole team,” says Craig Pollock. We want this to be the case until the Board of Directors if we can. We would like the Formula 1 team to be made up of an equal number of women and men in the future. “But the main stumbling block will be to obtain the approval of the paddock, the majority opposed to an enlargement of the starting grid.
