Khalil Beschir

Khalil Beschir (born 18 June 1983) is a Lebanese racing driver.

Beschir was born in Bhersaf, Lebanon. As a child, watching Formula 1 and the likes of his hero, Michael Schumacher, on TV, Khalil soon developed his lifelong passion for motorsport and realised his ambition to become a racing driver. However, it was not an easy path to take; growing up in Lebanon there were no race circuits and motorsport was hardly even recognised, let alone there being any education or support structure in place. His parents were unable to finance his dream so he did everything he could to save enough money to make the trip to Europe where he enlisted at a racing school in France.

The experience only confirmed to Khalil that racing was what he wanted to do and so he spent the next 3 years collecting enough sponsorship to secure a series of tests in Formula Renault 1.6.

By 2004, Khalil had gathered enough funding to compete in a full race weekend at Zolder, Belgium and he made an impressive debut, finishing in the top 10 against some of Europe's best up and coming drivers of the time.

With money soon running out, Khalil decided to sell his road car and he got a job working for the team in Belgium as a mechanic in a bid to get more mileage in the car and to put together a budget for another race weekend.

Entering only his third race at Spa, a problem in qualifying forced Khalil to start from 42nd on the grid. An outstanding drive saw him battle his way through the field to finish 6th, taking fastest lap of the race in the process.

His performances soon caught the eye of popular F1 and IndyCar driver manager, Rick Gorne, who offered to manage Khalil and run him in the BAR-Honda Drivers' Program. Unfortunately Khalil was forced to turn down the opportunity due to being unable to finance his living expenses in tandem with the program.

Then the chance to represent his home country in the A1 Grand Prix series. In a shootout against 6 other drivers in Formula 3 cars, Khalil came out on top and was handed the race seat.

In preparation for his A1GP debut, Khalil competed in the Italian Formula 3 Championship, finishing just outside the top 10. He was also entered for selected races of Euro F3000 where he still managed a creditable 13th in the drivers' standings despite contesting less than half the season.

Khalil resides in Milton Keynes, UK.

In late 2005, Beschir began competing in the A1 Grand Prix series. In the inaugural A1GP feature race at Brands Hatch while he was 7th overall, his car rolled at Paddock Hill Bend after making contact with A1 Team Italy's . His best finish in the series was 8th at Durban in 2008 which made him the first driver to score for the team. Beschir was one of only 3 drivers from A1GP to win an award in 2006; he won the award for "Most Extensive Product Testing".

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