Rookie Porsche Sprint Challenge winner Prince Saud excited about future of Saudi motorsport

JEDDAH: Although the third Saudi Arabian Grand Prix has given motorsport fans three days of adrenaline-packed racing, one of the other races that took place at the Jeddah Corniche this weekend was the Porsche Sprint Challenge Middle East series.

Rookie winner, Prince Saud Bin Mu’tasim, told Arab News how excited he was with his victory.

“I just came out of the race and I’m full of adrenaline, I won my rookie championship in GT3 and Porsche Sprint Challenge with Saudi Racing team,” he said.

After last season in the GT4, he added that this year he and teammate Khalid Al-Ahmadi were both rookies in GT3, which has a more sophisticated car.

“We’ve been competing all season again like we did last year, and it’s a really good feeling to win in GT3 in front of my home crowd, in front of Formula One, and to get this exposure — it’s really amazing,” he said.

Prince Saud added that preparing for the races can be very stressful because one has to compete to impress.

“You need to impress potential sponsors, and potential growth in the sport is really stressful because any mistake you make — and especially specifically on a track like Jeddah where there’s a lot of walls, and it’s very fast — you don’t have time to make mistakes, so it was really stressful preparing for it,” he said.

Prince Saud also said he was very impressed with how motorsport in Saudi Arabia is growing rapidly and wants to see more national talent involved.

“Anyone who’s interested in getting into motorsports, I should advise them to start in karting, and they will have a bright future hopefully,” he said.

The newly-crowned rookie champion thanked Minister of Sports Prince Abdulaziz bin Turki Al-Faisal, and the president of the Saudi Automobile and