The Formula Vee maverick who has reached the top

Formula Vee is not usually an easy championship to win. The 750 Motor Club's long-running VW Beetle-engined single-seater series features constructors and engine builders that have decades of experience in the category. But, it is possible for self-built creations to still challenge the likes of the AHS, GAC and Storm (built by SG Race Engineering) machines that populate the series.

Graham Gant proved that in 2019 as, after years of toil with his own Worm's Eye View car, he finally landed the crown. And now James Harridge has achieved the same feat after a dominant 2020 campaign with the Maverick Vee he and his father built - a car with the very humblest of beginnings.

Harridge's father Dave used to compete in Formula Ford 2000 in the 1970s and 1980s, so Harridge Jr grew up in the racing world.

"My dad first put me in a kart when I was six in 1992 and I did schools karting when I was 10," he recalls. "I was eight-times national schools karting champion."

The next part of the story is very familiar. Like scores of youngsters racing karts, Harridge struggled financially to make that next step and move into cars. The Harridges attended numerous race meetings over the years as they tried to find an affordable way to compete. But, in the end, they decided the cost of buying a car was too great and opted to build their own Formula Vee challenger. They were attracted to the series by its affordability and its competitiveness.

"In 2010/11, you had people coming through it like [British Touring Car champion] Ash Sutton and Mike Epps and it was a competitive formula, so it was appealing," says Harridge.

Work started on the Maverick back in 2007, but it was six years later before it finally competed in its first race. Progress on the car was slow and there was never a clear design that was followed. Instead, the Harridges made use of what they could find and attended numerous Vee events to try to work out what rivals had done.

"The car was made from odds and sods we had lying around," admits Harridge. A typical example of this concerned the bodywork, which was created from scratch. The moulds were made from wood and fibreglass - and even the edge of a dustbin was used for inspiration for the shape.

"Lots of bits were scrap metal," Harridge continues. "The trailing arms are a kart axle broken up and a lot of stuff came from the skip at Rye House kart track, with their permission! It's quite amazing how it turned out so well!

"The biggest challenge was money and funding it. Formula Vee is a bit of a black art and not many people want to give away their secrets. We were doing it by eye - it wasn't a CAD design, it was made up as we went along.

"We were quick and getting pole positions and leading races, but no matter how much I tried we would blow up - and this went on for years" James Harridge

"We built it in my dad's back garden, in the shed [where his karts had earlier been prepared]. When we finished the car, we got it into the garden and had to get the neighbours to take their fence down to take it out through the side, as there was no access! We got there in the end."

But the Maverick did not enjoy the most encouraging of debuts in the 2013 season finale at Donington Park.

"My dad first drove it in 2013 for one last race, and it was awful and we got lapped," remembers Harridge Jr. However, there were signs of encouragement.

"When my dad drove it, because he had done previous racing, he knew the car handled quite well," says Harridge. "I thought the balance was brilliant!"

Another year was spent tinkering on the car before Harridge Jr contested his first Vee season in 2015. And immediately he turned heads. In the season-opener at Brands Hatch, he pressured multiple champion Paul Smith's AHS Dominator throughout - and Harridge says "that was a definitely a surprise to everybody".

That proved to be one of the high points as, for several seasons, the Maverick struggled with terrible reliability. Harridge attributes this to the fact that he and his father had also developed the engine, again to save costs, and had struggled to perfect it.

"We were quick and getting pole positions and leading races, but no matter how much I tried we would blow up - and this went on for years," he says. There were occasions when the engine did last - he took victories in the first races of the 2017 and 2018 campaigns - but it was only when he enlisted the help of Vee veteran Alan Woodward of GAC Motorsport to build the engine that the final piece of the puzzle was in place.

"He didn't do a lot different to what we were doing, but it's those little things that matter," says Harridge. "That's been the reason we're dominating now - it's the reliability [that's made the difference] not the speed. It's helped me to concentrate on the driving rather than worrying about what's going on behind me. People didn't really bother chasing me for a while [knowing he was unlikely to finish the race]."

But the rest of the Vee field has been doing a lot of chasing in the condensed 2020 season. Finally, the sweet spot of the Maverick was found and Harridge dominated, winning seven of the eight races to sweep to the crown. All of those hard hours spent in his father's shed have been rewarded.

"A couple of times I was tempted to give up because I was spending all that money, which would've been a shame - and it's nice to get something out of it after all these years," he admits.

Not everyone thought the rather rudimentary machine would be destined for success, however. One of the Maverick's key distinguishing features is its zero roll rear suspension, which Harridge says is crucial to the car's good handling. He recalls ex-Lotus Formula 1 driver and 750MC vice-president John Miles wandering over at Snetterton one year and being very sceptical of the suspension and its lack of anti-roll bars, something Lotus fan Harridge Sr was disappointed to hear.

"John Miles said, 'That's never going to win a race'," Harridge Jr remembers. "He tried to tell us it wasn't going to work and why. He said we needed to change the suspension and we proved him wrong, bless him." Miles died in 2018, before the Maverick had really hit its stride. "It was a shame he wasn't able to see us winning," Harridge adds.

Now he has landed that Formula Vee crown, Harridge has had thoughts of racing elsewhere. He has targeted a move to Formula Ford 1600, even considering adapting the Vee machine to run in the category. However, budget has again proved to be a stumbling block. "I had one offer for the Formula Ford Festival but I couldn't it, which was a shame," he says.

It may not be a Formula Ford, but there has been some more activity back in the shed in Harridge Sr's garden as work on a second-generation Maverick Vee is under way.

"It's exactly the same - with the same tubular frame - bar the front suspension, as we've done something a little bit different there," Harridge says. "It's the little things we've learned, but it's all the same [otherwise]. Hopefully, we will get that out next year - maybe we'll rent one out and have a team going."

"The car was made from odds and sods we had lying around. Lots of bits were scrap metal. The trailing arms are a kart axle broken up and a lot of stuff came from the skip at Rye House kart track" James Harridge

Looking back on those early days beavering away in the shed, Harridge admits he did not initially fully appreciate the challenge of what they were undertaking.

"I don't think I realised at the time how much effort has gone into it," he says. "Everything has been made by hand, all the welding was done by us. It's a massive task with everything [needed] to do it successfully.

"A lot of it has been learning as we've gone along. It's been a massive commitment but we get to spend some time together. I spend every other evening, for a couple of hours, in the garage fiddling away. It cost about £3500 to build, but the number of hours on the car far outweighs the cost!"

But, despite the colossal investment of time, what the Harridges have proven this year is that you can still build a car in a shed in the back garden - even from bits of scrap metal - and achieve success. There may generally be more professionalism now, but the stereotypical maverick nature of club racing competitors can certainly still be found.

Why Formula Vee retains its popularity

There are not many categories where you can build a complete car from scratch yourself, and long-time Formula Vee engine builder Alan Woodward, who resolved Harridge's engine woes, believes that is one of series' strengths.

"I think it's brilliant," says Woodward, whose GAC concern also began creating its own cars from scratch in the 2000s. "The series is nearly 60 years old and there's still innovation and the rules have stayed fairly stable.

"We had Mike Jenvey come along years ago and he did something similar. He developed his own suspension and wiped the floor with us. I redesigned my car after that - I modified five for the start of the 2007 season and three were in the top three in the championship that year."

Woodward has been involved in Formula Vee since 1993 and feels the series still has plenty to offer. And, when looking at the size of the grids, you can certainly see why. Twenty-nine cars competed in two of the events during the shortened 2020 season, and Woodward believes the cost-effectiveness of the championship is a key reason for that.

"With tyres, one engine rebuild, and any damage, you can do a full season for sub-£10,000," he says. "It's so cost-effective and it's a very competitive formula."

Considering that the series is based around the Type 1 powerplant from the original VW Beetle, sourcing parts may become ever harder, but Woodward has no immediate concerns.

"Getting good quality parts for the engine is getting more difficult, but we're still doing it," he says. "It's working well, and you don't fix something that isn't broken."