SubaruSport

Creating a New Competition

The SubaruSport series was a concept born in the late 1980’s from Ykä Palotie and Keke Rosberg, both key members of the 500-Kerho racing club. They were concerned that the pathway for Finnish drivers racing in Finland was too expensive and disorganised. Crucially they believed that these factors were damaging the next generation's progression into elite European motorsport.

Together they wanted to create a Finnish championship that operated in a similar way to how the Formula Vee format had in the 1970’s. The Finnish national series had helped elevate Keke from karting up the ladder into European Super Vee, Formula 2 and ultimately F1. Finland did have its own national Formula Ford competition at this time, but it wasn’t able to attract the numbers required to make it a competitive championship. 

With Mika Häkkinen having recently moved up to the British Formula Vauxhall Lotus series, Palotie’s and Rosberg’s first thought was to develop a Finnish version. The comparisons to Formula Vee were strong with General Motors also running a European GM Lotus championship similar to how VW had supported national Formula Vee with European Super Vee. With the approval of both 500-Kerho and Finnish General Motors, initial plans were drawn up during 1988. These included proposals regarding rules, the financial structure of the championship and circuits to be used. The AKK (Finland's motorsport sanctioning body) were contacted for their support and were largely positive about this new race series.

​

Unfortunately discussions with General Motors stalled and the project fell through. With all the time and effort spent on the structure of this new championship neither Palotie or Rosberg wanted to give up on the idea. They were keen to get 16 new racing cars into the national Finnish motor racing scene and wanted to help enthusiastic young drivers progress into international competitions.

So in January 1989 they submitted new plans to the AKK for a two-seated covered formula. The reason for changing to a covered two-seated format instead of the initial single seater concept was that it allowed for stakeholders to be given demonstrations laps in the vehicles, helping to sell the championship to sponsors. These new plans were approved by the AKK for further development and the new series began to take shape.