Former IMSA World Sports Car champion and FIA WSC C2 champion Fermin Velez lost his battle with cancer on March 31, just four days shy of his 44th birthday. Velez started his racing career in British F3 in the late ’70s, but rose to prominence when he won Spain’s National Hillclimb Championship in 1982, ’84 and ’85.
Velez made the move to endurance racing in the FIA’s C2 category for World Sports Cars where he won the championship in 1987 and 1989. From there he moved to IMSA where between 1990 and 1998, he scored 11 victories and 16 2nd places, including victories in the 1995 and 1997 12-Hours of Sebring driving a Ferrari 333SP. Velez also won the IMSA WSC championship those same years. Later in his career he focused on Indy car racing where he made several starts in the Indianapolis 500.
