Once upon a time, I came up with the idea to create a website, a website that is dedicated to Unraced Formula One projects. Better said the idea was and is to create the Ultimate database of failed F1 ventures over the last 60 years and further. Many of these attempts to appear on the grid are long forgotten and lost in the dark corner of Formula One’s history. While many of these stories tell us how pure the passion is of these adventures to appear on the grid. Ok, sometimes it is just for the own pride or the money.
Five years ago, my dad passed away, after a long time of taking care of him I had out of sudden free time. Very quickly, I came with the idea to start with UnracedF1. I have had always that passion to discover the hidden and forgotten history of Formula One. I remember that I once wrote an article about the Phoenix Grand Prix team in 2002 in some Dutch Motorsport magazine. As the years followed, I started to look on the web for more of these stories and came across many forums, website and newsgroups. However, no site just dedicated to these unraced stories.
In 2013, I officially registered UnracedF1 and started this amazing adventure with a friend of mine, who is now one of the key people at GPRejects, to explore these unraced projects and to gather as much as possible background information to bring the full stories back to life and show the pure passion Formula One. However, the start with UnracedF1 was a bit messy I did not know what direction I should go on, and there was not really a site design. We had ideas how the site should look like, as seen in the picture, but it was too hard to create this by our own. The interest in the UnracedF1 got lost and I decided to collect more information about the Unraced projects.
End 2015 I designed very cheaply a site and published the first articles, the first reaction from people where blessing. They loved the stories I brought to the web, and they loved the research I did to these projects. This gave me more energy to continue on this way with UnracedF1. Earlier this year I redesigned the website completely to give it a better look and have it better navigated on any device, even on a smartwatch the site is viewable! In addition, the quality of the articles were improved and thank to tricks I learned for a Dutch gaming site I knew where to look at, and how to create the articles.
Thanks to the success UnracedF1 already brought, it became easier to contact former Team owners, Team managers, mechanics, and drivers and so on. It gives me always Goosebumps when I speak with a former employee of an unraced project. I have not spoken anyone so far who did not tell his story with full passion and love for the Formula One. It is fascinating to write these stories for UnracedF1. And to read the replies afterwards by people who loved the stories to.
UnracedF1 became my passion, a passion i love so much I even will go back to school for it. The planning is to follow a course for journalism so I am even better in interviewing people and improve my research skills. I have plenty of books, magazines and so on in my private archive. But a chat with a former employee of a team is still the best way to gain as much as possible information and write an article about it.