Alexandre Premat (Left) and Lapierre of Team france with the A1 Championship trophy in Shanghai

“Gentlemen, for the pride of your nations, start your engines.” The clarion call rang out for the first time at the season-opener in September at Brands Hatch in England and reverberated around the world in a live broadcast to a global TV audience. The drivers of Team India, Team Pakistan, Team China and 22 other national Teams fired up the identical Zytec V8 engines in their brand-new Lola racing cars. It was music to the organisers’ ears.

Sheikh Maktoum of Dubai, founder of the A1 Grand Prix of Nations, had ensured that the cars were equally matched in all respects, thanks to mega-doses of money and modern technology. It was now up to the drivers and the teams to show which nation was best. After England, there would be another ten racetracks at which nations could prove their mettle, from Dubai to Durban, from Sydney to Laguna Seca.

Nevertheless, the competition among countries for the World Cup of motorsport was formidable. Team Great Britain were being led by the most illustrious champion of them all, John Surtees, the only man in history to have won both the Formula 1 World Championship and the World Championship for motorbikes. Team Brazil and Team Australia were depending upon former F1 world champions Emerson Fittipaldi and Alan Jones, respectively. Jan Lammers, winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the world champion of Endurance Racing headed Team Netherlands.

Some teams had what they thought was an ace up their sleeves ? they engaged drivers from F1. Jos “The Boss” Verstappen, the fastest man off the starting line in F1, signed on for Netherlands, Alex Yoong for Malaysia and Tomas Enge for the Czech Republic. Team India tried to sign India’s first F1 driver, Narain Karthikeyan, but he was not available.

If motor racing is in the genes, then another clever strategy was getting the former champions’ sons to drive. Emerson Fittipaldi’s son Christiaan and F1 world champion Nelson Piquet’s son Nelson Jr shared the driving for Brazil. Triple F1 world champion Niki Lauda’s son Matthias turned out for Austria. American racing legend and former Jaguar F1 team boss Bobby Rahal’s son Graham raced for Lebanon at the end of the season.

Team India was launched with fanfare at India Gate, New Delhi, in the presence of Bollywood superstars Aamir Khan and Anil Kapoor. Administered by former Formula Asia Champion Akbar Ebrahim, India fielded Formula 3 driver Karun Chandhok and 15-year-old Formula BMW Asia driver Armaan Ebrahim. Given the extraordinary efforts made by the organisers to ensure a level playing field for all, they had as good an opportunity as anyone to make an impression.

Brazil showed early promise by winning both races in Britain. Other teams quickly learned the preparation, pit-stop and racing strategies for success. Quite unlike F1, because the A1 GP cars are so evenly matched, pit-stop strategies hinged primarily on when the safety car came out, if at all. The racing was fast and furious, wheel-to-wheel throughout the season. Highly entertaining, with overtaking and late-braking and lead changes that left the fans and audiences breathless.

Safe, well-designed cars that could be driven consistently and confidently at the limit ensured outstanding racing action. There were big racing accidents, as usual ? cars overturning, some hitting the trackside barriers hard, a few being wrecked beyond recognition. The drivers always escaped, usually unhurt, and lived to drive another day. If you want to see spectacular engine blow-ups with lots of billowing smoke and fireworks and drivers leaping out of their seats, you’ll have to look elsewhere. The engines in the cars proved virtually bulletproof and had clocked over 100,000 miles of racing by the time the last race ended in Shanghai!

At the end of the day, the different team strategies led to unexpected results in the final championship standings. Britain finished in third place, Brazil was sixth and Netherlands seventh, thanks to a win by Jos, the Boss. in South Africa. All three drivers with F1 experience managed to win a race each, Malaysia leaping up the championship standings from tenth to fifth as a result, and the Czech Republic finishing 12th ahead of Australia.

On the other hand, low-profile teams did well ? New Zealand came fourth, Ireland eighth and Mexico eleventh.

Team USA fielded top-class American drivers Scott Speed, Bryan Herta and Philip Giebler, but finished in 16th place.

Interestingly, Speed is now driving in F1 for Scuderia Toro Rosso. Neel Jani, who ensured Switzerland’s second place in the championship before bidding the team goodbye, joined Toro Rosso as their F1 test driver. A1 GP is all set to become the breeding ground for future F1 drivers.

When the dust settled, 8 different nations had won races. So who won the World Cup? A low-profile team that had no famous names really got their act together. Midway through the season, it was evident that they were the team to beat. Their 2 drivers, Alexandre Premat and Nicholas Lapierre were both remarkable in their consistency, and they set about winning efficiently and professionally. By the penultimate round in the US in March, France were World Champions.

What happened to Team India? A valiant effort notwithstanding, the team was unable to score any point. Their last race was at Sentul in Indonesia, and rumours that the team would not continue were well founded.

Team India did not race again, missing the remaining races in Mexico, the US and China. And this from a country with a 101-year history of motorsport going all the way back to The Inaugural Run in Calcutta in August 1904.

Will Team India rise like a phoenix from the ashes? Find out when the new, improved second edition of the A1 GP of Nations for the World Cup of motorsport begins on October1 at the historic Zandvoort circuit in the Netherlands.