Saudi Arabia might look like a modern motorsport hub today, with circuits and world stage events. But David Richards says the real story starts far earlier, when the Gulf’s organized racing infrastructure basically did not exist.

Richards, Prodrive’s founder and a former World Rally Championship-winning co-driver, points to the mid-1970s as the turning point for his own relationship with the region. He recalls getting an invitation from Rothmans, sponsors of the first Kuwait Rally, to go to Kuwait and organize the rally for them. With only a few weeks’ notice, he traveled to Kuwait to help organize it. The event worked, and it triggered further invitations across the Gulf to Qatar, Bahrain, the UAE, and Oman as rallying gained momentum.

To understand why this matters, you have to know how motorsport ecosystems actually form. Events are not just entertainment. They are operational testbeds that require a chain of capabilities: reliable logistics, safety standards, venue build-outs, sanctioning and governance, and sponsor relationships that can survive more than one season. Richards says that across the following decades, countries including Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, and the UAE developed structured rally programs, national motorsport federations, and world-class racing venues. Put simply, the region moved from “we drove cars in the desert” to a repeatable system that can host global-level series and teams.

Richards is also careful about how personal this evolution is. He points to how early relationships in the Gulf fed into Prodrive’s later engineering and competition work. After he won the World Rally Championship as a co-driver in 1981, Richards founded Prodrive in 1984. The Middle East stayed involved in the company’s story, with relationships formed during those early years later contributing to manufacturer programs, technical partnerships, and Prodrive’s return to the region through projects including the Dakar Rally. One of Prodrive’s earliest driver signings was Qatari rally star Saeed Al-Hajri, who Richards says went on to win the Middle East Championship on multiple occasions. Their “very successful relationship” endured long after their competitive years, with Richards describing how Al-Hajri texted him recently about Qatar’s chances in the World Cup.

For decision-makers, the second-order lesson is that infrastructure investment and human relationships build on each other. Richards says many of his closest motorsport friendships remain rooted in the Gulf, including long-standing ties in Bahrain and the UAE, and that the region’s growth has been powered by more than tracks. He credits volunteers, local authorities, and early commercial partners with establishing the foundations. He also remembers the earliest days as a world without “maps” and without “infrastructure,” where organizing meant working with people met on the ground and enthusiasts who believed it could work.

That belief now shows up in the kind of events the Gulf is hosting and the challenges those events present. Richards highlights Saudi Arabia’s rise as a major international motorsport destination, especially through hosting the Dakar Rally. He calls the Dakar “probably the most challenging motorsport event in the world,” and says the terrain in Saudi delivers that challenge, from open deserts to the Empty Quarter and the “unbelievable backdrop of AlUla.” He adds that competitors also receive an unusually strong reception across the Kingdom, with Richards saying the welcome is “incredible,” and that teams enjoy the presence of local hosts wherever they go.

Richards also argues that sustained investment is starting to yield a new generation of local competitors. “It doesn’t happen overnight, but we’re already seeing some very good drivers come through,” he says. He traces the region’s rallying history through pioneers including Al-Hajri, FIA President Mohammed Ben Sulayem, and multiple Dakar winner Nasser Al-Attiyah, while also pointing to emerging Saudi talent. For boards and operators, the implication is straightforward: once the sport builds a pipeline of events and coaching culture, talent becomes less imported and more homegrown, changing sponsorship math and long-term competitive positioning.

And then there is the future-facing angle, because Prodrive is trying to evolve alongside the region. Richards says Prodrive is working with British engineering firm JCB on a hydrogen-powered world land speed record project, reflecting the industry’s growing interest in alternative propulsion technologies. “We’re working with hydrogen now as a new technology,” he says, and describes it as an “interesting possibility for the future.” Richards also says Prodrive expects to return to the Dakar Rally next year with a new project, and that the company is exploring further opportunities following Saudi Arabia’s addition to the World Rally Championship calendar. He sums up the mindset with a simple line: “It never stands still.”

So what should leaders take from Richards’ 50-year perspective? His headline claim is that no one could have imagined the journey from early desert driving with few facilities to today’s circuits and best-attended events. The operational truth behind it is that the region built motorsport by stacking decades of governance, venues, and partnerships. For peers deciding where to allocate capital, staff, and engineering bandwidth, the message is: the payoff is real, but it’s slow. Start with small beginnings, then build the repeatable system that can scale from rally chaos to global stage certainty.