Why motorsport's winter training series is reinventing itself

There's something romantic about a summer spent racing single-seaters in New Zealand.

Back in the 1960s, the top Formula 1 drivers would head down under to spend January contesting the Tasman Series in Australia and New Zealand in Tasman-spec versions of F1 cars.

Bruce McLaren, Jim Clark and Jackie Stewart were all Tasman Series champions, while Stirling Moss, Jack Brabham and Keke Rosberg are all multiple New Zealand Grand Prix winners.

The modern day version is the Toyota Racing Series, a five-week rapid-fire championship run across January and into February that offers both a springboard for local talent and a warm winter haven for Europeans looking to stay match fit.

The category has been trucking along for 15 years now, and while the fields aren't populated with current F1 drivers like the old days, names including Daniil Kvyat, Lance Stroll, Lando Norris and, most recently, Lucas Auer have contributed to the romantic notion of the overseas ace on tour.

But romance alone isn't enough. The TRS organisers have recognised that if the series is to stay on the hit list for young drivers, it needs to stay cosy with the FIA. For that very reason, the freshly rebranded Toyota Gazoo Racing New Zealand organisation has bitten the bullet and introduced a brand new car for the 2019/2020 TRS season - the Tatuus FT-60, based on the FIA's Regional F3 chassis.

It's a big move. The Tatuus FT-50 is only five seasons old, which means its lifespan was half that of the preceding FT-40.

The significance of this change is that the TRS is a one-make series, which complicates the second-hand market for its cars. Toyota NZ itself will hold on to a handful of FT-50s for driver evaluation days and its work with the Kiwi Driver Fund, but there are also 12 chassis that will need to be sold. There are options such as a local Formula Libre series and racing schools, but at around $60,000 (in local currency) a pop the cars aren't easy to move.

So why make the switch now? Well, the number one reason is relevance. It's relevance to the European market that fuels the influx of overseas drivers each summer.

It's relevance to the FIA's single seater pathway that gives TRS its spot on the superlicence points table. The move to the F3-style chassis puts TRS smack bang in Tier 3 on the FIA's preferred pyramid, and ensures there are seven superlicence points on offer for the series winner.

"The FIA encouraged us to move forward on the next-generation car to be relevant for the table, and for the drivers themselves" TRS chief Nicolas Caillol

"The main thing was [asking] 'what is the most relevant car for us?'" says series manager Nicolas Caillol.

"The concept of TRS is as a training camp before drivers go into their main season. So, which is the best car we can have that brings out drivers who want to go further in their career? And with the FIA global pathway, the best spot we had was to be in an F3 Regional car. That's the most relevant car we can have.

"The FT-50 was unique to New Zealand, with no equivalent to the rest of the world. This car is relevant for preparing for Europe. It's the same car, so you don't have to relearn anything."

Safety has also clearly been a driving force behind the switch, and Caillol admits the series was "encouraged" by the FIA to move to something sporting a halo. There are also anti-intrusion panels, improved side impact protection, a lower nose cone and double wheel tethers to further enhance driver protection.

"The [FT-50] was still good, but when you look at the thing that is the most important for us, it is the safety of the drivers," says Caillol.

"Being in the FIA ladder, and being in the superlicence table of points, you have an obligation to be set certain standards with safety. And the FIA encouraged us to move forward on the next-generation car to be relevant for the table, and for the drivers themselves.

"It motivated us as well, just to go forward with the next-generation of car. Potentially, we could have done one or two years more with the FT-50, but to stay relevant and safe every category is going to the halo. The only category that hasn't is Formula 4, but by the end of this year or next year they're going to present a Formula 4 with a halo. By 2021 everyone will have it on their car."

But it's not just a raft of safety changes that separate the FT-50 and the FT-60. The chassis produces a whopping 25% more downforce than its predecessor, starting with a new front wing that features a main element and two flaps. There's also a vertical strake mounted on the sidepod to improve flow to the rear wing, and a rear diffuser to give the car better ground effect.

There's a brand new engine package too. The 1.8-litre naturally-aspirated 2ZZ-GE unit, which produced 215bhp, has been replaced by the turbocharged two-litre 8AR FTS unit, with an output of 270bhp.

There's also new rubber on the way, with the control Michelins set to make way for significantly wider Hankooks.

More power, downforce and tyre grip is generally a recipe for better lap times, but here's the fly in the ointment - the new car comes with around 150kg of additional weight.

So, will the FT-60 be faster than the FT-50? Probably. But will it be loads faster? Probably not.

"The thing is, with 150kg more, you need more than the extra 55bhp to compensate," explains Caillol. "But with the downforce level we have, we should expect the car to be slightly faster.

"When you see what happened with the Formula Renault, which is the same car, they've gone faster. And with the turbo, the torque makes it better on the exit of the slow corners, which will help compensate the fact that the car is a bit heavier."

Toyota New Zealand has been mindful of through the move to the new technical package is cost containment

There are risks that accompany the switch. For one, more downforce isn't always a ticket to good, close racing - although Calliol is confident that that won't be an issue, based on early signs from use of the Tatuus chassis in Europe.

Another risk is reliability. The series proudly reports that not a single 1.8-litre engine failed of its own accord in the history of TRS, which puts pressure on the new powerplant to be just as bulletproof.

"The good thing is, the engine preparer is exactly the same," says Caillol.

"We know the quality of work, and he's been working hard for the last eight months developing the engine. So, we're quite confident with the reliability, it will be similar to what we've had in the past. It's quite a big engine and there is a lot of potential in that engine in terms of horsepower. So, we won't have to be on the limit, so there's much more of a safe margin when it comes to reliability.

"We're racing five weeks in a row, we can't afford to have any kind of failure. We want to be on the safe side. We're still delivering performance, but not pushing the limit too much on the engine."

Relevance and romance are fine, but nothing trumps the bottom line. One thing Toyota New Zealand has been mindful of through the move to the new technical package is cost containment, wary that nothing poses a bigger risk to grid size than a spike in the required budget.

While the new chassis and engine haven't come cheap, the championship has absorbed much of that cost, which it justifies through the mantra that it's on the look-out for the nation's next world champion.

As a result, the series is expecting budgets to sit around the NZ$199,000 (€117,000) for a front-running seat, an increase of around NZ$19,000 (€11,000) compared to last season.

"The main hurdle is budget, because the main budgets in Europe are getting higher and higher and the money is limited for the drivers," says Caillol.

"But when you see the benefits of coming to New Zealand, five weeks in a row is pretty intense training. You do 3000km, 10 qualifying sessions and 15 races, and two and a half hours of free practice.

"When you look at the price per kilometre, it's not a big investment. If you look at Europe, basically December to March is winter, so it's hard to test. Coming to New Zealand in summer time and doing a lot of driving is a lot more beneficial than staying at home and testing during winter in Europe."

The spirit of TRS is much like the spirit of the Tasman Series. In an ideal world, the grid is a healthy mix of European guns looking to stay sharp over the winter, and local talent looking to measure themselves against the Europeans.

"At the start of the series, in the first five years, it was mainly New Zealanders," says Caillol.

"The core spirit of Toyota is to promote the Kiwi drivers, and having drivers like Marcus Armstrong, Liam Lawson, Brendon Hartley, Nick Cassidy shining - they all learnt the basics in New Zealand.

"It's a good balance for us between promoting the Kiwi drivers, but also being somewhere for international drivers to come and train. You can go back to the 1960s with drivers like Jim Clark coming to New Zealand to race during the winter, it's a tradition.

"When the drivers are competing and they win, for example, the New Zealand Grand Prix, they look at the names on the trophy and see names like Bruce McLaren - these kind of drivers were here to race in the winter.

"It's about keeping the tradition of winter training going."