New Zealand’s first Formula Ford champion, David Oxton and international racing teenager Louis Sharp will be special guests at the first-ever pre-season launch for the New Zealand Formula Ford championship, taking place at Rodin Cars tomorrow.
Oxton won the inaugural Formula Ford championship in 1971 and backed it up with a consecutive title in 1972, driving the same Elfin 600 Superford.
Fifty years later, Sharp was plucked from the South Island Formula Ford series and, in 2022, headed to the UK to start racing Formula 4. He went on to win both British F4 and GB3 consecutively for Rodin Motorsport.
For the first time in the category’s history, the teams and drivers are getting together for a pre-season launch, and Rodin Cars’ impressive manufacturing and testing facility near Waiau, North Canterbury, has been chosen for this special occasion, with Oxton and Sharp invited to join the 13 registered drivers for the 2026 NAPA Formula Ford championship.
Both drivers acknowledge their careers took off after competitive stints in the New Zealand Formula Ford championship, which heads into its 55th season at Invercargill this weekend.
“Formula Ford was the championship that launched my career into car racing, the first step for a lot of people coming out of karts,” said Sharp.
“In terms of learning all my craft, car control, and understanding how a single-seater works came from Formula Ford. It doesn’t have any downforce, doesn’t have any slick tyres, so it’s the raw mechanical feel of the car that is so powerful, and I think that’s something you can’t learn anywhere else.”
Sharp is currently home from Europe to contest the CTFROT championship before returning next month for a second season in the FIA Formula 3 championship.
“You only have to look at the list of world champions that have come out of Formula Ford since we started to see the significance of the category,” said inaugural winner David Oxton.
“It created a series where the driving was paramount. You had to literally guide the car through the corners without scrubbing off speed. It taught us racecraft, and this still applies fifty years on. You watch the current cars and drivers, and they’ve learnt the art of making sure they don’t give time away.”
Oxton won consecutive Formula Ford titles, the second while he was also racing a Formula 5000 car, in which he won two consecutive Gold Star championships.
Winning the Formula Ford title also gave him the opportunity to race in a Formula Ford world final in the UK, not dissimilar to the opportunity Rodin Cars is offering the winner of the 2026 championship 55 years later.
Last year, Rodin Cars launched an initiative in conjunction with MotorSport New Zealand, a pathway from Formula Ford to Formula 1, powered by Rodin Cars, which gives the opportunity for a driver to test a Formula 4 car in the UK with Rodin Motorsport.
While at Rodin Cars, the entrants for the new season’s NAPA Formula Ford championship will get the chance to drive their cars around one of Rodin’s test tracks, experience the testing and driver lounge facilities, and join a guided tour through the engineering and manufacturing facilities.
From there, the teams will head south for back-to-back championship rounds. The opening three races will be held at Teretonga Raceway this weekend before a quick turnaround to Timaru’s Levels Raceway for the second round the following weekend.
Header Image: Geoff Ridder
