Opinion: Ferdinand Habsburg

The Austrian archduke should make a splash on his move into the WEC and ELMS for his on-track form, and for helping to save a South American forest

“I’m privileged to be racing in a 4.2-litre V8 LMP2 car, which makes a proper noise”

Racing is something I’ve been doing intensely for the past 12 years since I started karting when I was 11. This year, I’ve moved from the DTM into LMP2, and will be racing in the European Le Mans Series with Algarve Pro Racing alongside Richard Bradley and Diego Menchaca, and in the FIA World Endurance Championship with

WRT alongside Robin Frijns and Charles Milesi.

Now that I’m racing all over the world, I’ve noticed the waste that we produce and leave behind. Over the winter I was trying to find a way in which I could become more aware, more sustainable. I wanted to have not only the benefit of being very passionate about our sport, but also try to change the wasteful nature that the sport has.

So I started this campaign called Drive Fast, Act Faster. It was helped out a lot by me joining Algarve Pro Racing for the ELMS, because Stewart Cox the team owner is very motivated by this kind of energy. And he basically told me,‘ ferdinand, you can have the car livery however you want, you can have free rein and you can make changes, as long as you’re the one who puts in all the effort, ’because obviously he’s extremely busy getting all the cars ready, and the number-one priority is still to win races.

I’ve implemented a few changes at the team to reduce our waste, changes that anybody can do, and found a system that anybody can very easily offset all of the carbon emissions that we still put out. But then I didn’t want it just to be me. I wanted to create a statement from the racing community and see how it took off, and that’s what Drive Fast, Act Faster is about.

I’m trying to connect all the teams, all the drivers we can get together, and collectively protect a specific forest that I’ve grown very fond of in Ecuador. It’s called the Narupa Reserve, and it’s the forest that you’ll see on the livery of my car. It’s the most biodiverse forest on the planet, and that includes flora and fauna. It’s extremely dense, and I thought,‘ why don’t we have this forest protected by a racing championship? ’each team or each car that partakes in this protects 10 to 15 acres of this forest, including our car obviously.

We’ve got other projects, like trying to use more sustainable materials for team kit – all the team kit we’re using is made out of upcycled plastics. Then all the team kit that I’ve been designing and working on, all of the excess from that will be turned into merchandise, which will then be sold online through my website, and 100% of the proceeds will go also to the Narupa Reserve. This is my attempt to bring the fans into the emotion of trying to protect this forest, so it’s not just those of us who are racing who are taking part in this campaign.

Using scientific evidence of how much CO2 gets eaten up by the Narupa Reserve, we know that one acre can store up to 40 tons of CO2. Therefore, to protect three or four acres would be more than enough to offset my ELMS campaign. However, we are protecting 10 acres, and in the WEC it’s 15. The point here is to protect as much rainforest as possible, to go beyond merely offsetting our carbon footprint and to really make change. Those acres that we want to protect are currently mainly in the ownership of deforestation companies.

Green Future Project are the people who I’m working with. They are working with a local NGO called Foundation Jocotoco, which then goes to the deforestation companies, cattle breeders and private farmers to buy the land and integrate it in the reserve. So instead of the deforestation company going there a month later to take away all of the forest, it stays there.

I’m privileged to be racing in a 4.2-litre V8 LMP2 car, which makes a proper noise. You can see the trend of championships moving away from that, and if that trend were to continue I’d be worried that one day in the near future it would start having a large effect on our motorsport, and my children and my children’s children might not have the opportunity to see V8s, let alone V10s, racing head to head around a race track in an intense battle with top-class drivers. And I would be very sad to see that happen. For each race weekend that I have in ELMS and WEC, I’m targeting two or three teams and drivers who I believe might possibly have an interest, so I’ll be trying to expand the campaign and get people involved.

We shouldn’t feel uncomfortable about motorsport. We should be aware of the benefits we have from the sport, and try to outweigh the negatives that we do produce. That’s why I’m trying to get as many people as I can onto this, because imagine if we are truly able to protect one of the most valuable forests on the planet, just by our racing community. It would be such a huge achievement, and only because of our passion for our sport. So the more I try to get this out there, the more we reach people and get them involved, the cooler the sport will become for those of us who are conscious and are aware.