Teenage Kiwi open-wheel driver Louis Sharp will become the youngest driver to ever compete in the internationally-acclaimed Race Of Champions at Sydney’s Accor Stadium, March 7-8.
Sharp moved to England two years ago and has since won the 2023 British F4 Championship and 2024 GB3 titles.
“Teaming up with Hayden Paddon to represent New Zealand in our first-ever Nations Cup at ROC— this is something special,” said Sharp.
“It’s crazy to think I was born the same year Sebastian Vettel won his first ROC Nations Cup title, and now I get to race against the very icons I grew up admiring.
“With Race Of champions making its debut down under, I hope we see plenty of Kiwi flags flying high in Sydney.”
Sharp, who will celebrate his 18th birthday on May 11, will join one of his boyhood racing heroes in rally ace Hayden Paddon as part of Team New Zealand for the 33rd edition of the spectacular Race Of Champions, which will include some of the biggest names in world motorsport.
“It’s a hugely proud moment for both Louis and myself to represent NZ for the first time at Race Of Champions,” said Paddon.
“We will both be giving it our all to try and beat the other nations’ teams in what is a fiercely competitive field.”
“It’s also great to team up with Louis again, who actually co-drove for me once when he was just 12 years old.”
“It’s amazing to see his progression and success. He looks destined to be in F1 if he continues doing what he is doing.”
On his ROC debut, Sharp will represent New Zealand in the ROC Nations Cup on Friday March 7, before going head-to-head with some of world motorsport’s most accomplished stars on Saturday 8th March, including four-time Formula 1 World Champion, Sebastian Vettel; current F1 ace Valtteri Bottas; seven-time Supercars champion Jamie Whincup, nine-time FIA World Rally Champion, Sébastien Loeb; former FIA F2 champion and F1 driver, Mick Schumacher, NASCAR star Kurt Busch and 11-time X Games Gold Medalist and action sports legend Travis Pastrana.
Sharp, born in Britain, but raised in Christchurch New Zealand, started his career in karts and moved back to the UK in 2023 where he won the British F4 title.
Motorsport News voted Sharp as (British) National Racing Driver of the Year for 2023, becoming the youngest ever driver to win the award, the first from outside Europe and the first single seater winner. He was also awarded the Henry Surtees Award, an accolade handed out by the British Racing Drivers’ Club for the most outstanding performance by a member of the BRDC Rising Stars initiative.
“I don’t want to put any additional pressure on Louis or fear into the Australians… but this young man seems spectacularly quick and mature for his age,” said said Race of Champions President Fredrik Johnsson.
“He has won every championship he has competed in since moving to England, and at the end of the season Euro Formula test at Monza he was quickest, 1/10th faster than Ollie Bearman who tested the same car as Louis for the same team.”
“Every now and again a young talent comes along that deserves your attention, Louis certainly falls into that category and we are delighted to be able to invite him to our first Race Of Champions in the Southern Hemisphere. It will be a perfect opportunity for him to meet some of his childhood heroes like Sebastian Vettel and for the world to discover this future star.”
“Louis has been nominated by critics as an F1 star of the future and I have little doubt that in a few years time we will be saying ‘I saw that kid for the first time at the Race Of Champions at Accor Stadium in Sydney’.”
Last year Sharp stepped up to GB3 (British F3) and won the title to become the first driver to win back-to-back British formula championships since Ayrton Senna.
In his GB3 debut at Oulton Park Sharp won the double pole and beat Lando Norris’ long-standing qualifying pole margin. He went on to become the first rookie and youngest driver to win the GB3 crown.
Ironically, Norris was the previous youngest ever ROC competitor, having turned 18 a few months before his ROC debut in Riyadh in 2018.
Shortly after clinching the GB3 title, it was announced that Sharp would compete in this year’s FIA Formula 3 championship with Rodin Motorsport, which is owned by Kiwi entrepreneur David Dicker.
In 2019, at the tender age of just 12, Sharp was co-driver for Paddon in the NZ Ashley Forest Rallysprint – which they won.
The Race Of Champions will run over two nights with a purpose-built 1km tarmac track taking centre stage at Accor Stadium, Sydney’s Olympic Stadium.
