Talented South African teenage rally driver Henk Lategan has been selected as a wild card for the elite Young Driver Excellence Academy, run by the International Automobile Federation, world governing body of motorsport.
He'll join the winners of five regional selection events including fellow South African Kelvin van der Linde, winner of the African Regional selection, which was hosted in South Africa by Motorsport South Africa, along with four other wild cards selected by the Institute and the Academy Instructors.
Beginning in December, the Academy provides a fully-funded training programme aimed at helping drivers to develop their motorsport careers, while increasing safety skills and actively promoting the principles of safety, fairness and responsibility, both on and off the track.
STRONG PERFORMANCES
Lategan was chosen on the back of some strong performances in Europe, particularly his appearance in Rally Croatia, where he scored several second-fastest stage times against some notable competitors in a representative European championship field.
His showing was even more notable in that this was his first appearance in the European Rally Championship, and only his second full tarmac rally.
Each country was entitled to nominate only one competitor for the selection event for their region and Lategan was narrowly beaten for the South African nomination Van der Linde - winner of the international VW Scirocco Cup - who then went on to win the African Regional selection.
In addition to Van der Linde the Regional selection winners were:
Europe: Ignas Gelzinis (Lithuania)
Middle East: Abdullah Bamogaddam (Saudi Arabia)
The Americas: Diego Ferreira (Venezuela)
Asia-Pacific: Akhil Rabindra (India)
They'll be joined by Lategan and four other wild card entries chosen by the FIA Institute and Academy instructors to make up the 10 in the final group.
They are:
Jorge Cevallos (Mexico)
Michelle Gatting (Denmark)
Mauricio Hernandez (Costa Rica)
Erik Johansson (Sweden)
South Africa is the only country with two representatives in the Academy - and it's also the only country with two selections for the Scirocco R-Cup evaluation in Germany as part of the Women in Motorsport Commission promotion of women in racing. Pepper and are two of 12 ladies from 11 countries selected to take part.
We did wonder why Danish teenager Michelle Gatting missed the cut for the R-Cup evaluation after finishing fifth in this year's R-Cup - until we noticed that she's one of the wild cards (and the only girl!) nominated for the Academy.