From a pit village to the pit lane

From the sound that bellows out, you would be forgiven for thinking you had taken a wrong turn and were approaching Becketts at Silverstone on the day of the British Grand Prix, rather than cruising past Manor Drive. Welcome to the home of Britain's – and Yorkshire's – brand new Formula 1 team.

Here, in this small corner of Rotherham, they are living the dream. Manor Motorsport, now Virgin Racing, received the green light last June to join the likes of Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes and Lotus in Formula 1. The Dinnington team line up against the world's best in the first race of the new grand prix season in Bahrain tomorrow lunchtime.

John Booth is a Rotherham butcher and a Rotherham United fan. So far, so ordinary. But he's also the man at Manor Motorsport's core. A quiet, unassuming tactician, he launched the team from his garage in 1990. He was a single-seat champion before forming his own team and establishing it as a proud little operation with an enviable track record.

For John, motor-sport is a family affair. His wife Mary and their two daughters Victoria, 24, and Laura, 23, have lived in the fast lane all their lives and put as much heart and soul into the family business as dad.

"When you're working for your family you have that extra motivation, that extra drive, because you want it to succeed," said Victoria. She officially joined the Virgin Racing cause in January when the size of the challenge became apparent.

Her sister Laura began work last September and is now personal assistant to the team manager. All three women are willing to answer phones or book flights, anything to help out. "We work very long hours, but it's all worth it," says Victoria.

"Unfortunately we have to hold the fort most of the time and stay here in Dinnington. But Laura is going out to Australia for the second race, then I'll join them all in Malaysia the following week.

"I've not got any experience in the work I'm doing, only the life experiences my dad has given us. I've been going to races since I could walk. I've always been around the race industry, I know a lot of the team members and the drivers. It just seemed a natural progression to come on board."

And as well as the excitement of a new journey into a world of glitz and glamour, the most overwhelming emotion for Victoria is her admiration for what her father has achieved. "The biggest thing for us was how proud we are of our dad to do something like this. We just wanted to help out in any way that we could to help it succeed and get the cars on the grid."

Manor Motorsport began modestly in the Formula Renault support classes. Then early last year the door to the previously closed world of Formula 1 swung open. It happened because of a radical move by the sport's governing body, the FIA.

With one eye on the economic downturn, the FIA proposed to cap the amount individual teams were allowed to spend annually on their cars at 40m. That antagonised the moneybags outfits, the leading manufacturers like Ferrari, who feared a levelling of the playing field would diminish their dominance.

But it created an opening for small-timers like John Booth. He promptly put his foot down and has stormed through that enticing gap towards the prospect of global recognition.

In June 2009, after four months of quiet planning, Manor GP, the grand prix arm of the motorsport company was announced as one of four new teams to take the grid in 2010. It marked the start of a new low-cost era for Formula 1.

"I was at a race meeting with our Manor boys when I got the call," John Booth recalls of the magic moment. "Everyone was just gobsmacked. It was an incredible and emotional moment, one I'll never forget."

They stand with Lotus (a Formula 1 power of the '60s and '70s now back in the fast lane) as the only two of the quartet of new teams to have tested in Spain last month and be ready for the grid in Bahrain tomorrow. That speaks volumes for the amount of work the team has put in over the last 12 months.

Manor GP's cause will be aided by the profile of Sir Richard Branson and the support he is providing through the Virgin brand. "It gives us tremendous credibility out there," says John. "It was a suitable vehicle to use Manor for the entry, but it was always possible for the plan to change.

"To have somebody like Sir Richard and Virgin on board is a dream come true. When you watch him in interviews he's a global media figure and one of the most recognised faces on the planet."

Branson was involved in Formula 1 last year as a sponsor for Brawn GP. This team had emerged out of the ashes of the collapse of the Honda team. The newcomer raced away to win the constructors championship, resurrecting the career of Britain's Jenson Button – who lifted the drivers championship – along the way. But Branson decided against putting his money into Brawn this time round. The reason why is complex. The Formula 1 teams' association (FOTA) vetoed the FIA's proposed 40m capping. That led to a stand-off of several months last year which threatened to become a permanent rift. For a time, a breakaway grand prix series looked on the cards.

A compromise was eventually reached. FOTA agreed to slash spending on the cars, back to the more modest levels of the 1990s, by 2012. The fall-out from this arrangement priced Branson out of an extended stay with Brawn GP. The new Virgin Racing set-up was unveiled last December, after being a pit lane secret for months. They enter a Formula 1 arena rich in history but about to embark on a tricky adjustment to global economic uncertainty. Spiralling costs have already forced out of F1 the world's biggest car manufacturer, Toyota, as well as BMW. Toyota pulled out last autumn having ploughed 300m a year into a team which never won a race.

So what chance Virgin Racing on a budget of 40m?

"The FIA in their wisdom quite rightly decided to introduce some sort of cost restriction," says John Booth. "At the same time as making Formula 1 more affordable for its current competitors, it opened up our own horizons."

For starters, the Yorkshire team will have a fraction of the manpower of the big teams. True, the workforce at the team's Dinnington home has tripled, but starting from a base of 18 employees the new squad is still tiny by Formula 1 standards.

They operate in partnership with Wirth Research in Oxfordshire, and the input of Nick Wirth has been priceless. A former technical director of Benetton, Wirth's pedigree includes being an F1 team owner in his own right with Simtek in the 1990s.

He has taken a radical approach to developing the new Virgin Racing VR-01. Instead of the traditional method of building a car via wind tunnel technologies, the 110 engineers at Wirth's plant in Bicester in Oxfordshire have designed this one on a computer screen and tested and developed it through virtual simulators.

It is a gamble – and one that early on-track testing reveals is not yet up to speed. The new car lapped between four and 10 seconds slower than the quickest cars on the grid at last month's extensive testing sessions in Spain. The team remains confident that their method is the cost-effective future for Formula 1.

Germany's Timo Glock signed up as lead driver last November. In his two years with Toyota the 27-year-old had three podium finishes. He turned down the advances of Renault to take on the challenge of establishing a brand new team among the elite of F1.

"We could not have wished for a better driver in Timo," said Booth. "His whole attitude is fantastic. He came to talk to

us thinking 'what am I getting myself in for?' He spent a couple of

hours here and loved the small team environment. He has no outrageous expectations for the first season and will be superb for us."

Partnering Glock is Lucas Di Grassi, a 25-year-old Brazilian who finished third in the Formula 3 Euroseries as a Manor driver in 2005 and won the Macau Grand Prix. "Lucas knows the engineers well and the set-up of the car," added John. "People look at him as being purely a rookie, but he has massive experience of testing in Formula 1. To me it is as good as having two experienced drivers in the team.

"In 2010 my idea of success is to run reliably, safely and efficiently and earn the respect of our peers in the paddock. We need to perform well as a team, then we can start carrying that through into car performance. Our clear objective is to end the season as the best of the new teams."

So they attempt to qualify today for the start of what will be exciting

times. Bahrain is just the beginning of a 19-stop car chase around the globe which by the end of the season will have been watched by a television audience of 600 million.

By the final chequered flag they may have altered the world's perceptions of what is possible in an old South Yorkshire mining community, especially if you have a local family racing together.