With a second finish in his group in the Shanghai Rally, the first stop of the 2001 China's National Rally Championships which finished on Sunday, Beijing driver Zhou Yong started another round of campaigning behind the wheel.

Zhou, with a driving career of about nine years, still does not consider himself to be a real professional.

In fact, the 31-year-old won last year's overall individual championships and represented China in several elite international events, including the World Rally Championships.

Despite batches of honours, he knows motor sport in China is too immature to be called a professional one.

"Even now, I still can't make a living driving, although I have devoted almost all my life to it," Zhou said.

Money has always been one of the biggest agonies for China's growing auto sport, which has a formal history of less than 15 years. Zhou's story demonstrates very well how the developing process for the young sport is going.

Zhou, a machinist graduate and former employee of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, one of the nation's prestigious research sites, resigned from his former post in 1992 to devote himself to the sport, about which he once only received information through limited TV coverage.

Zhou has always sought every possible opportunity to attend competitions when cars are still a luxury for most Chinese people.

Alongside Zhou there are many enthusiasts engaging in the sport and living with crippling financial problems and huge debts.

"The money problem has had more of an impact on my driving career than winning anything," said Zhou, who has reached the high point of his career.

Zhou's ambition is not just about winning the national title. What he wants most is not the various titles from the tournaments, but a rally team set up by himself which could be run in a professional way.

There are less than 15 auto teams in China and the one Zhou represents, Beijing Haidian, which has only two drivers, is very typical. Many of the staff members in his team had to rush to the site from their posts at regular work units right before the competition.

"I'd like to have some stability, not have to keep jumping from here to there," Zhou said. He believes stability will be much better for the sport.

To achieve his dream, Zhou said he needed to put more efforts into finding sponsors.

Although his results in the Shanghai competition did not live up to his expectations, Zhou said he was happy because during the rally, he had started serious talks with sponsors for the first time.

Zhou said a vigorous auto sport requires not only talented drivers but also sophisticated organizers.

"We used to have so few well-known events, and we are trying to build the National Rally Championships into a star event - that's our main goal of the year," said Chen Xuezhong, deputy secretary-general of the Federation of Automobile Sports of China, the organizer of the tournament.

"More and more drivers and sponsors are willing to join in," said Chen, a former driver.

"I believe there will be a large stage for China's auto sport in the future."

The next three stages of the tournament will be held in Changchun, Kunming and Shaoguan.

(China Daily 03/12/01)