F1 and India

It has been about 3-4 years since I started following F1 races. And since then, this sport has really been growing on me. Everything about F1 is simply amazing. The previous season had been as interesting as the T20 world cup final (Thank God India Won!). For the first time in F1 history, a rookie had made everyone rethink their strategies with his mind boggling performance. Lewis Hamilton, a 22 year old boy, who started his F1 career with a superstar-like debut in F1 had made 2007 one of the most memorable years in F1 history. A podium finish in his debut race is something which was never ever witnessed in F1 earlier. And as if that was not enough, Hamilton had remained in the top 3 spots throughout the season. He had given F1 biggies like Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa a run for their money. Also, he was labeled as the 'first black driver in F1'. Here are all the details about Hamilton. His record is simply amazing keeping in mind that he is a rookie. Even Michael Schumacher got his first victory 1 year after his debut.
However, I feel that in India F1 does not get the amount of attention it deserves. In fact, more than half of the people hardly know who Lewis Hamilton is. In India, the only person that comes to one’s mind when we think of F1 is Michael Schumacher. The rest of the drivers like Hamilton, Alonso and Massa are as popular in India as Shaktimaan is in the US. One of the main reasons for this lack of interest is that there is no Indian driver in F1 currently.
In fact, Narayan Karthikeyan is the only Indian driver till date who has ever made it to the F1 level. But it was not so easy for him to get there. Just his driving skills were not enough for him to participate in F1. As it is an expensive sport, he also had to raise enough money to get there. And in India it was a big challenge because most of the people were not ready to invest in him as they thought that it was a big gamble. So it took him around 3-4 years to gather ample money. Then finally, he made his debut in 2005 racing for the Jordan-Toyota team. But he was not able to make it big in F1. Karthikeyan’s stint with F1 was not as successful as Hamilton’s but still there is one really good thing that he did for India. He managed to ignite an interest for F1 in the minds of many Indians like me who had never bothered to stop surfing through channels whenever they came across an F1 race on the TV set.
Since then, the popularity of F1 has been on the rise in India. Even though it has been rising at a snail’s pace, it should become really popular in the coming years. There are two major reasons why I believe so:
[1] Finally, a track for F1 is supposed to come up in India. In September 2007, the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) had announced that India will host its first Formula One race in 2010. The circuit location has been finalized as Greater Noida, near Delhi. The circuit will be 3.1 miles in length and will be designed by F1 circuit designer Hermann Tilke.
[2] Now, there is also an Indian F1 team by the name of Force India F1. The team was formed in October 2007, when a consortium led by Vijay Mallya and Michiel Mol bought the Spyker F1 team.
Ironically, Force India F1 does not have any Indian drivers at the moment because there were no Indian drivers to choose from who had an ample amount of experience in F1. Although, the team has not been performing very well, it should become better with time as they have been improving their infrastructure constantly since the time they bought Spyker.
Now that F1 is becoming popular in our country as well, we can expect to see more Indians participating in F1 soon enough, and the best part about it is that we will get to see them racing on a track which is in India itself! Cheers to Team India!