FIA Historic Championships

After the upsets of COVID made it difficult for them to run International Championships for the last couple of years, Masters Historic Racing decided at the end of last year that it would continue to run its Formula 1 and Sports Cars as Internationaol Series again this season and they have registered both series with Motor Sport Ireland.  Pre-COVID, both series ran as FIA International Championships.  With the F1 or Formula One moniker no longer available to a non-FIA championship series, what was the FIA Masters Historic Formula One Championship has been re-named the Masters Racing Legends, while the sportscars have become the Masters Sportscar Legends for 2022.  The Lurani Trophy for Formula Junior cars has also decided to leave the official FIA fold to run under an International Series permit this year.  The expense of running as an FIA championship has been cited as one of the reasons to make the change, especially as some of the costs were traditionally shared by both organisers, and with one or the other gone, it would leave the remaining one to bear all the costs.

The fees that go to the FIA are low, as the FIA gave a special dispensation to historic events, but the fees taken by some ASNs have increased in recent years to the point of discouraging organisers from running as Championships.  The other costs include paying expenses for stewards and race officials from outside of the country in which the competition is held, which is mandated for FIA Championships.

The FIA historic championships that remain are the FIA Historic Rally Championship, the FIA Historic Regularity Rally Trophy, and the FIA Historic Hillclimb Championship.  The only circuit championship that remains is the two-heat, single event FIA Historic Formula 3 European Cup, which runs at the Zandvoort Historic Grand Prix in July and is organised directly by the secretariat of the FIA.  These FIA championships are reporting good grid sizes this year.