Formula Community

Formula Community is an upcoming team-funded series built from the ground up solely on the team owner's voting power. Initially each of the entering teams were able to invest up to £500,000 to buy in to the series, which bought a share of the voting power. Teams then had to use their remaining cash to purchase vehicles and hire drivers.

Voting Process
A unique draw-card for Formula Community is that almost every aspect of the competition has been decided by voting. As each team's voting power is dependent on the share owned of the competition, it is not necessarily number of votes that decides each ballot. For a decision to be made, a >50% majority must be achieved (unless down to two options), meaning that if no option has a majority second preferences come into play.

Issue 1 - Location of Series
Teams voted on which continent to base the series, although the decision did not preclude races from being held on other continents, if voted on later. The following options were available:


 * Europe
 * North America
 * Asia - including Australia and New Zealand
 * South America
 * Africa

Asia took an early lead following the first round of voting, but did not achieve the required majority. As North America, South America and Africa did not have the required votes to achieve a majority, they were eliminated from the voting process and the second round began. In a surprising turnaround, it was Europe that took some late preferences to edge out Asia.

Issue 2 - Type of Vehicles
Teams next voted on what vehicles would be raced in the series. Once again there were five options as follows:


 * Open Wheel
 * Touring Cars
 * GT Endurance
 * Motorcycles
 * Super Karts

Voting opened, not without some controversy as the Australian Racing Academy declared they would withdraw from the series if the motorcycles option was selected. This was then followed by German team Renntechnologie GmbH attempting to auction off their vote to the highest bidder, a move that despite attracting several bids was denounced by many teams and led to Renntechnologie withdrawing their offer to sell their vote. Tassie Racing then attempted to change their vote, a move the Australian Racing Academy protested and sought clarification on the legality, with it later being ruled that vote-changing was not permitted.

Despite the string of controversy, Touring Cars took an early voting lead and never looked back, although it withstood a late charge from Super Karts in the second and third preferences.

Issue 3 - Major Sponsor
This time there were six options for the major sponsor for the series. Each option had its own unique terms, benefits and pitfalls:


 * BMW - £4,000,000
 * Teams must run BMW 1 Series Sport Hatch
 * Must be at least two events in Germany
 * Nokian Tyres - £1,500,000 + free tyres to all teams for duration of series
 * All teams must run Nokian Tyres
 * There must be at least three ice/snow rounds, with one of these rounds in Finland
 * Castrol - £2,200,000
 * At least 50% of teams must run Castrol fuels
 * At least six academy drivers
 * Series must not be a spec or semi-spec series
 * MotorsTV - £0 + Free television coverage
 * Emirates - £1,000,000 + associated costs with hosting rounds in the Middle East
 * At least three rounds must be held in the Middle East, with one of those in Dubai
 * None

After some strong opinions raised between the teams, and an unprecedented four rounds of preference voting, it was Nokian Tyres that were decided on, and thus became the competition's major sponsor.

Issue 4 - Class of Touring Cars
Teams were next given the option on four types of touring cars to be raced:


 * S2000
 * Multi-Class Sports Cars
 * Silhouette Cars
 * GTC V8s

This issue produced some fairly close voting, but after GTC V8s and S2000 were knocked out and preferences counted Silhouette (tube-framed) cars was decided on!

Issue 5 - Vehicle Technical Regulations
Teams now were invited to vote on three issues at once, engines, driver aids and specification parts.

Engines

 * V8s
 * 1.6L Turbo Hybrids
 * Electric

Driver Aids

 * Open Driver Aids
 * Driver Aids Banned
 * Standardised Driver Aids

Specification Parts

 * Chassis only - all parts except chassis are open to change
 * Full Specification Parts - no parts open to change
 * Full Specification, minus engine - only engine open to change
 * Full Specification, minus aero - only aerodynamics open to change

Voting Results
On each issue the winning option generally won in dominant style, meaning some options were decided before all teams had even voted. By the end of the voting process it was decided that the vehicles would run 1.6L Turbo Hybrid engines, with standardised driver aids and the vehicles would be full specification except for the engine.

Issue 6 - Calendar
Teams were next invited to propose race tracks and calendars to make up the first season. With suggestions as diverse as Suzuka, Japan and Circuito de Pucarani, Bolivia, the decision was not going to be an easy one. In the end, four calendars were short-listed as follows, with suggestions from Auricom, RennTechnologie and El Cartel Suramerica making the final cut plus a combined calendar with the most popular suggestions of tracks collated.


 * 1 - The Standard Calendar includes a £10K tax for each team in order to secure the final round at Silverstone.

Auricom's Standard Calendar took a huge lead early on, but was only slightly short of the 50% majority required, meaning that the vote had to go to preferences once again. However it was a matter of par for the course and the Standard Calendar was decided on with 49.05% of the vote.

The result was controversial for a number of reasons, with some teams claiming that they were not aware a £10K tax would apply and that it should be voted on. The series promoter also made a snap decision to change the first round from Jerez to Moscow, with Equipe Gauthier paying the £100K difference. No official reason was given for the change, but it went largely unnoticed with more teams complaining about the tax. No official response was given for the tax either by the promoter, and teams eventually were distracted with the next issue - race format.

Issue 7 - Race Format
The promoter gave teams options on the race weekend format, with choices for the On-road and Off-road events.

On-road

 * Two Race Format - Qualifying session to determine grid for 100km race. Finishing positions of race determine grid for second race of 150km with top 10 positions reversed
 * Heat Races - All drivers participate in three short sprints with best drivers progressing to a final with the grid decided by heat results
 * Endurance Race - One 400km race with pit stops
 * Multiple Formats - Mix of formats throughout season

The On-road format was decided in just one round of voting, with 52.27% choosing the Two Race Format.

Off-road

 * On-road Format - Same rules as On-road
 * Qualifying Races - Qualifying session followed by single medium length races with top drivers progressing to a final
 * Versus Format - Drivers race in groups of four with top two progressing to next stage until four left for a final

Unlike On-road, the Off-road format took two rounds of voting with the teams split fairly evenly across the three options, but preferences favoured the same format as On-road, and it was therefore chosen.