MAX SET TO RACE INTO RECORD BOOKS AGAIN!
Ardingly College student Max Chilton has had a roaring success in his first season as a Formula 3 racer.
Max broke the record as Britain’s youngest-ever F3 racer, set by Nelson Piquet Jnr, when he raced just one day after his 16th birthday in April.
However, at the end of a season which has seen him flying – and racing! – all over Europe, he is about to become one of the youngest competitors ever in the 200mph+ top speed class!
It could be that Max IS the youngest racer in the 1000-Km Le Mans series, but, as records don’t go back to 1906, when the race first began, the teenage speed-fiend will unfortunately never know!
Max has spent the season racing all over the UK and Europe – from Donnington Park and Brands Hatch to Monza and Bucharest.
But the real coup comes next week, he will be racing a Le Mans prototype 650bhp Zytec 07, along with his brother Tom, in a 1000-Km Le Mans series race, at Silverstone.
Max has been racing since he was a boy, starting out on local karting circuits, but his ambition has always been to make it as a top Formula 1 racer. If he does, he will be following in the footsteps of another old Ardinian, Mike Hawthorn.
Mike, was Britain’s first ever F1 World Champion when he won the race in 1958. Nicknamed the Farnham Flyer, Mike competed in 45 Grand Prix races, winning three and in pole position four times.
Max, who lives with his parents Nadine and Grahame, at Norwood Hill, near Horley, is now into his all-important GCSE year so will be knuckling down to his studies once the racing season is over.
Max races with Arena International Motorsport and team principal Mike Earle said: “I am very impressed with Max, not just for his ability, which is outstanding, especially when you consider his age, but also his attitude which is exactly what I want to see in a driver.
“He has a special talent and enormous potential. It’s our job now to help him achieve that potential.”
Ardingly College Headmaster Peter Green said: “Ardingly College has a long tradition of turning out some remarkable sportsmen and women but Max has to be one of the fastest!
“To see someone so young on the verge of a professional racing career is very exciting indeed and everyone at the College has followed his first season in Formula 3 with great interest.
“Max has had to be very disciplined to keep up his school work as well as putting in all the time and effort needed to reach this exceptional standard of racing we are very proud of all that he has achieved.”
