Race of Champions is returning to London
The Race of Champions, a popular motorsport event first organised in 1988, will once again be held in London, which was the host in 2007 and 2008. This year’s Race Of Champions will take place on November 20/21 at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, home to the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games.
The Stadium at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, a former Olympic Stadium, will host some of the world’s greatest drivers in a bid to find out who is the quickest of them all in ROC’s identical machinery. One of them, David Coulthard, the winner of the 2014 Race of Champions, has already visited the stadium with the cup he got last year at the event in Barbados.
The ROC started in 1998 and till 2003 was held in Gran Canaria. In recent years, ROC has visited the Stade de France in Paris (2004-2006), London’s Wembley Stadium (2007-2008), the ‘Bird’s Nest’ Olympic Stadium in Beijing (2009), Düsseldorf’s Esprit Arena (2010-2011), the Rajamangala Stadium in Bangkok (2012) and Bushy Park Barbados (2014).
The Race Of Champions brings together some of the world’s greatest drivers from the world’s major disciplines, including Formula 1, World Rally, Le Mans, MotoGP, Nascar, IndyCar, X-Games and other series, and sets them free to battle head-to-head in identical cars.
The event takes place over a span of two days: first comes the ROC Nations Cup where the drivers pair up in teams based on their nationalities to bid for the title of the ‘World’s Fastest Nation’. On the second day, it’s time for the Race Of Champions itself, when teamwork goes out of the window and it’s a flat-out battle for individual glory.
The most successful nation was Germay with six wins. Victories were achieved six times in a row from 2007 to 2012 and winning team always was the same – Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel.
Among the drivers, a record holder with four victories is former WRC star Didier Auriol. Matias Ekstrom and Sebastien Loeb have won three times each, while Stig Blomqvist and Juha Kankkunen have had two wins each.
Drivers with a single victory each include Andrea Aghini, Francois Delecour, Carlos Sainz, Colin McRae, Tommi Makinen, Harri Rovanpera, Marcus Gronholm, Heikki Kovalainen, Filipe Albuquerque, Sebastien Ogier, Romain Grosjean and David Coulthard.
Reigning champion of the champions, David Coulthard visited the stadium and said: “It’s fantastic that the Race Of Champions is coming to London. Each of the events has been special in its own way but with so much racing heritage in the UK and as a Brit myself, to host it here in an iconic venue like the former Olympic Stadium is a big deal. I’m sure it will be the best one so far.”
