IT all began with a go-kart.
Marlon Stockinger remembers it was in the year 2000 when the soles of his shoes first touched the asphalt at a race track in Carmona, Cavite. He was 9.
Now, the 24-year-old Filipino-Swiss Formula 1 (F1) junior driver is tagged as the “Prince of Speed.”
“It was just bonding time with my Dad,” Stockinger said of those years when he spent weekends driving go karts.
“All I knew then was that I was enjoying what we were doing,” he added.
Stockinger said he never thought go-karts would be the start of his race to success.
“My homegrown talent came from the islands here [before I] moved my talent across the earth. I have to really thank all the opportunities with go-karts and all the championships. It’s [go-kart racing] been a big part of my career.”
At the age of 17, Stockinger left for Europe to pursue his passion and started to create his name in the field of car racing.
He started to make a noise in the international scene when he won in the Senior Rotax World Finals in 2007 and in the Formula BMW Pacific Championship in 2008.
In 2010 he won first place in the Croft Circuit making him the first Filipino driver to win a formula race in Europe.
Two years later, Stockinger wins first place at the Grand Prix 3 Series in Monaco. He was drafted as a junior driver in the F1 team by 2013.
“It’s kinda crazy cause you never [thought] that it will ever happen in your lifetime.”
Car racing may not be a sport close to the Filipino culture but Stockinger still hopes to encourage more Filipino youth to engage themselves into the sport.
“I could only hope that I could inspire the next generation to come along because technically motorsport is definitely [for] very talented [young people].”
Stockinger announced last week he will be a guest judge and a mentor of an academy (which he didn’t name) that would promote motorsports in the country through different avenues.
“[Some] people always tag racing as a very elite sport, as very expensive, but in this case we’re giving people a free chance to set a lap time in the virtual world, which might actually end [them] up getting into chance to race professionally in the real world.”
Being the only Filipino racing internationally today, Stockinger believes there will be more Filipinos gracing the world stage in the future.
“I definitely believe, through other avenues, you’ll be seeing more and more Filipino racing drivers.”
Karen Krizia Constante and Jhoana Paula Tuazon