The 2010 Superleague Formula season was the third Superleague Formula championship. The series was rebranded "Superleague Formula by Sonangol", due to a two-year deal that began in the previous season. The first race of the season was on 4 April at Silverstone and it finished on 24 October at Navarra after a series record of 12 race weekends in all. The series' prize fund was increased to €5 million, with the championship-winning team winning €1 million. Superleague Formula teamed up with The NewsMarket to distribute video content to 25,000 global media outlets in over 190 countries throughout the season. Ex-Formula One and WTCC driver Tiago Monteiro praised Superleague Formula by saying he was "pretty impressed with what they've done so far". R.S.C. Anderlecht, run under Azerti Motorsport with driver Davide Rigon, were made champions, but only after the last Super Final of the last event of the season. It was R.S.C. Anderlecht's first series title but the second for Rigon, who won the title with Beijing Guoan in 2008.
María de Villota replaced John Martin at Atlético Madrid prior to round 2 at the TT Circuit Assen. Martin joined 2008 champions Beijing Guoan, who came into the season partly due to calls from promoters in China who wanted to see their return. Franck Perera replaced Duncan Tappy at CR Flamengo.
PSV Eindhoven, with driver Narain Karthikeyan, did not compete at round 3 due his involvement in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race on the same weekend.
Olympique Lyonnais skipped the Zolder round after parting company with driver Sébastien Bourdais. Also for Zolder, Andy Soucek replaced Borja García in the Sporting CP car, and Jaap van Lagen replaced Franck Montagny at GD Bordeaux. Reid Motorsport took over the running of the PSV Eindhoven car from Racing for Holland.
Round 7 at Brands Hatch saw the return of club Olympique Lyonnais with new driver Franck Perera and Laurent Rédon's team rebranded as Laurent Rédon Motorsport over the previous incarnation as LRS Formula. Franck Montagny also returned to the GD Bordeaux car. Alpha Team was renamed Alpha Motorsport and fully merged with ADR.
Ben Hanley replaced the injured Chris van der Drift for Olympiacos at Adria. Olympique Lyonnais ran their third driver of the season, Celso Míguez, now managed by the Drivex team. Sporting CP and GD Bordeaux cited "technical problems" for not competing, leaving a record-low 16 clubs to race. Maxime Jousse almost had to stand-in for brother Julien at A.S. Roma following a biking accident. Frédéric Vervisch replaced James Walker at Liverpool F.C. and Hywel Lloyd replaced Narain Karthikeyan at PSV Eindhoven.
At Portimão, Olympique Lyonnais ran their fourth driver of the season, Tristan Gommendy and have new management at the Atech/Reid partnership. Máximo Cortés raced for Sporting CP and Celso Míguez moved to GD Bordeaux as Drivex switched to manage these two cars. Andy Soucek returned with Galatasaray S.K. who switched to GU-Racing. Neel Jani stepped into the Olympiacos machine, as Ben Hanley was contesting the Karting World Championship. The field was back to featuring eighteen cars again.
Former champion Adrián Vallés returned to the series at Ordos, with Sporting CP, now run by Emilio de Villota's squad. Andy Soucek moved to Flamengo and Franck Perera raced in the now Azerti Motorsport-run Bordeaux car. Giacomo Ricci, Bruno Méndez and Adderly Fong all made debuts; in Soucek's vacated Galatasaray seat, for Atlético Madrid and PSV Eindhoven respectively. Ben Hanley returned to Olympiacos after Neel Jani drove for them in Portimão. Also making an appearance at Ordos was a Team China car with Qinghua Ma at the wheel. Visa issues ruled out Álvaro Parente from Ordos, with Earl Bamber stepping into Parente's seat at F.C. Porto.
Álvaro Parente returned to the F.C. Porto seat for Beijing, leaving Earl Bamber to move to PSV Eindhoven, replacing Adderly Fong. Fong did however compete in qualifying and the first race having replaced Qinghua Ma at Team China following the practice sessions. Paul Meijer returned to the series, replacing the injured Bruno Méndez at Atlético Madrid.
For the season finale at Navarra, Esteban Guerrieri returned with PSV Eindhoven, becoming their fifth driver of the year. María de Villota rejoined Atlético Madrid and Máximo Cortés stepped into A.S. Roma's car. Chris van der Drift made an early return with Galatasaray S.K. following his accident at Brands Hatch.
2010 Schedule
A provisional calendar for the season was leaked on 21 October 2009. Alex Andreu, Superleague Formula founder, stated after the 2009 season finale that "we are already looking forward to our third season next year and expanding our calendar to 12 rounds". In December, the FIA published a 2010 calendar, confirming 6 events, with a 12-race calendar released on 12 January 2010 and Adria, Istanbul and Spa all missing. Adria returned to the calendar at the series' media day at Assen on 22 March, replacing Monza. Other changes saw Oschersleben, Estoril and Jerez dropped in place of the new Circuito de Navarra and the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve in Portimão. In July 2010, the series' first non-European events were announced — two race meetings in China, with the first being at the newly built Ordos International Circuit and the second around Beijing's new street circuit. The Beijing meeting was a non-championship event, after the track failed to gain the required FIA Grade 2 status in order to host a championship event.
The races had four different commentators on the SF World Feed: Ben Edwards spoke at six rounds, Martin Haven commentated at Silverstone and the Chinese races, Jonathan Green was at Jarama and John Hindhaugh did the Adria and Portimão rounds. Abi Griffiths became the new pitlane reporter, replacing Ben Constadanduros and Warren Pole. Co-commentators were Bruce Jouanny, Earl Bamber, María de Villota, Ho-Pin Tung and Andy Soucek.
Race 2 starts with reverse grid from finishing order of Race 1.
All events included a Race 3 as in 2009.
Test calendar and results
There was a test session prior to round 1 of the season, on 1 April at Silverstone Circuit. Julien Jousse was the fastest driver, for club A.S. Roma, during a rain-soaked test session.
Championship standings
† Round at Beijing was a non-championship event with no points given out for any of the races. * María de Villota finished 12th in race one and retired in 17th from race two at Jarama. She was subsequently disqualified from race two, after the race had finished, for crashing into Sébastien Bourdais early on after spinning off the track herself. She was also excluded from the race one result and lost the 14 points she would have earned for that finish. Chris van der Drift qualified for the Super Final at Brands Hatch but was unable to compete due to suffering injuries from a large crash in race two which led to him being taken to hospital with a broken ankle, two broken ribs, a cracked shoulder blade, a dislocated shoulder and two broken fingers. His Super Final place was taken up by the seventh highest points-scorer of the weekend, Yelmer Buurman. ;Race 1 and 2 points
Position
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
5th
6th
7th
8th
9th
10th
11th
12th
13th
14th
15th
16th
17th
18th
19th
20th
21st
22nd
DNF
DNS
Points
50
45
40
36
32
29
26
23
20
18
16
14
12
10
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0
;Super Final points
Position
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
5th
6th
DNQ
DNS
Points
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0
New for 2010 was the rule that a driver had to finish a race in order to earn points, instead of just having to start. Another change this season saw, unlike in 2009, the Super Final count for points. The winner gained 6 points, runner-up 5 points, down to 6th place who gained 1 point, they had to qualify for the race by being one of the top six overall weekend's point scorers but unlike in the two main races they did not have to finish the five laps in order to collect points.
Liverpool F.C.
Atech GP/Reid Motorsport
Frédéric Vervisch
Sporting CP
Borja García
A.C. Milan
Yelmer Buurman
Narain Karthikeyan
Adderly Fong
Earl Bamber
Esteban Guerrieri
Olympique Lyonnais
Galatasaray S.K.
GU-Racing International
Olympiacos CFP
Neel Jani
CR Flamengo