It’s a famous old adage in racing that to finish first, first you must finish. Well, one race in Malaysia this weekend has proven that wrong.
Just when we thought we’d seen everything in motorsport, the Formula 4 South East Asia (F4SEA) series provided the world with a race that nobody finished.
F4SEA is a low-cost, junior open-wheel formula using control vehicles. It’s part of the F1 driver development program, and drivers are eligible for Super License points.
The first round of the 2017 series took place at Sepang this weekend, supporting the Formula 1 Malaysian Grand Prix. The round encompassed six races, all run over three days.
This weekend’s racing saw races two and three run back-to-back, over eight laps each. All nine drivers successfully negotiated a rain-affected second race, then lined up for race three.
All seemed fine until Indonesia’s Perdana Minang stuttered to a halt on lap five. Shortly after that, four more drivers came to rest, without any contact. The seventh lap accounted for three of the remaining four drivers, all breaking down. That left Kane Shepherd of Thailand out in front on his own on the final lap, before his car also stopped.
The culprit? Fuel.
It transpired that the team that runs all nine cars, Meritus.GP, had not put sufficient fuel in the cars for the two races. Each car simply ran out.
Peter Thompson, chairman of series organiser Asian Autosport Action chairman said:
“I apologise unreservedly for the results of Race 3. With Races 2 and 3 back-to-back and without the possibility to top up, we filled the cars for both races before the start of Race 2. However we miscalculated the requirements. As we are a one-team championship all the drivers were unfortunately affected.”
Spare a further thought for Shepherd too. As he wasn’t able to complete his final lap, the organiser determined that the race was a result of force majeure. The official standings rolled back to the end of the last lap the whole field completed.
This gave the win to Danial Frost of Singapore — perhaps the only person ever to win a race with no finishers.
