The Indian Grand Prix, which ran for the second year inGreater Noida, outside New Delhi, was one of the Formula One races that hadonce seemed would never happen, could never happen and then not only did it happen, but when it didit wowed the world.
After Formula One came to China in 2004, India remained thelast frontier. The powerhouse on the subcontinent was a vast and potentiallylucrative market for the series and its sponsors. Formula One races had begunto be televised in India regularly in the 1990s, and the Kingfisher beer andairline company, owned by the racing fan Vijay Mallya, had been sponsoringteams since the mid-1990s. He then went from sponsorship into team ownership,creating the Force India team in 2008.
Indian drivers like Narain Karthikeyan raced with the Jordanteam in 2005 and was a test driver at the Williams team for a couple of seasonsafter that. This year he is driving for the HRT team. Karun Chandhok startedracing in the series at the new Hispania team in 2010 and also drove for Lotusin 2011.
Indeed, all that was missing was an Indian Grand Prix.Virtually all of the new races around the world had come about thanks tofunding by local governments. In India, government support of a car race wasnot a priority, although the government did show some interest.
Eventually when a decision was taken to host it at Noida,racing against time and employing thousands of workers , India managed to buildone of the world’s great sporting stadiums, the Buddh International Circuit,with a gargantuan, curved awning overhanging the 13,000 seats in the grandstandof the main straight and a world-class pit and paddock area. The organizers hadfulfilled their commitment to Formula One to perfection. The track itself alsosurpassed expectations. Because it had been completed at the last minute, manydrivers and teams had feared that it would not be ready for racing. It wascovered with dust, and many expected a fiasco of a race.
In the end, however, the opposite happened. The trackproduced a surprisingly uneventful race. It was difficult for drivers toovertake, there were only a few minor incidents, and Sebastian Vettel won,taking his 11th victory of the season for the Red Bull team. India itself cameout looking like a winner. The fans proved to be among the most knowledgeablein the world. A total of 100,000 attended, filling the grandstand with thepromise of a great future for the Indian Grand Prix and helping justify theprivate enterprise that had created it. Although it is still out of reach forthe majority of Indians, the Indian Grand Prix ended up fulfilling one of itsmain roles for the wealthy: As a place for business-to-business activity, itinstantly became one of the most popular for the corporate team sponsors,potential sponsors and their guests to meet.
