Malaysia is one of a few countries in the world capable of producing Formula One drivers. Alex Yoong made it as Minardi's second driver in 2001 and 2002, albeit as a pay driver* and more recently, 25-year old Fairuz Fauzy was selected as a test driver for Spyker F1.

While Yoong's involvement in F1 was (I'm sorry for being rather crude) a farce, let's hope Fairuz Fauzy has a slightly better racing career. Yoong holds the dubious honour of being the least successful F1 racer of the 21st century and before he came along, I had never before seen a DNQ, which stands for Did Not Qualify.

My issue, however, is with the way A1 Team Malaysia is set up. For non-racing junkies out there, A1 is a competition which takes place during F1's off-season. Unlike F1, all A1 teams use the same engines, so the amount of money a team has is not an indicator of how well a team will do. The current driver for A1 Team Malaysia is Alex Yoong.



I don't mean to be disrespectful to Mr. Yoong, for I think he briefly captured the imagination of all Malaysian motorsport fans when he briefly dabbled in F1, but me thinks he would do better if he followed the cue of Shahrol Yuzy.

Yuzy was a motorcycle racer who briefly competed in the FIA World Motorcycle Championships, but when he lost his race seat, he retired and opted instead to help other up and coming talents to achieve what he achieved. This is what I think Mr. Yoong should be doing.

Mr. Yoong has done the nation a service by buying an A1 seat on behalf of Malaysia (along with his business partner Jack Cunningham), but let's be honest about it, his performances in A1 aren't exactly anything to shout about. We finished 5th overall last season and with three races to go this season, we're in 7th position.

Instead of continuing around aimlessly, I really think Mr. Yoong should consider giving others a chance to drive. Potential future drivers for Malaysia like Aaron Lim and Nik Iruwan should be given a chance in A1, just to see how well they do and perhaps even blood them for a future F1 drive. As good as Mr. Yoong is, it's terribly difficult to see him regaining a seat in F1.

I'm not asking him to retire completely. All I am saying is he should probably consider rotating once in a while with a younger driver. He was feted as a national hero in 2001 for being Malaysia's first F1 driver. But he'll be an even bigger hero in my eyes if he can somehow produce future world beaters.

* A pay driver is a driver who pays to drive for a team instead of a having a team pay him to drive