Brendon Hartley |
|---|
|
| Topic Navigation |
|---|
|
Wikipedia: Brendon Hartley
Page Sections Biography Photographs |
Biography
The following section is an excerpt from Wikipedia's Brendon Hartley page on 17 March 2019, text available via the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Brendon Hartley is a New Zealand professional racing driver who formerly competed in Formula One for Scuderia Toro Rosso. As of 2019, Hartley is a test and simulator driver for Scuderia Ferrari.
He won the 2015 FIA World Endurance Championship, alongside his teammates Mark Webber and Timo Bernhard, and also went on to win the 2017 FIA World Endurance Championship alongside Bernhard and Earl Bamber. He won the 2017 24 Hours of Le Mans with Bamber and Bernhard. He made his Formula One debut for Scuderia Toro Rosso at the 2017 United States Grand Prix.
Hartley was born in Palmerston North in a family well integrated within motorsport. His father, Bryan, had raced in many forms of motorsport, most notably Formula Atlantic. At the age of six, Hartley began his motor racing career in kart racing, following in his brother Nelson's footsteps.
Six years later, the young New Zealander competed in his first full-scale race championship, competing in the Formula First category. Up against many seasoned veterans, Hartley finished the season in seventh. In 2003, the thirteen-year-old got his first major break as he won that year's New Zealand Formula Ford Festival which resulted in him getting a drive for the following year's Formula Ford championship. In a car his brother used the previous year, he started four races and won two of them.
After a season in Formula Toyota New Zealand, Hartley moved to Europe, competing in the Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 and Formula Renault 2.0 Northern European Cup (NEC). The New Zealander finished 14th and 10th in the Drivers' Championship in the Eurocup and North European Cup respectively, taking a podium position at Anderstorp in the latter. His second year in Formula Renault saw him stay in the Eurocup, but move from the NEC to the Italian championship. That year saw him take three wins in the Eurocup and three podiums in the Italian championship, and take the championship title in the Eurocup.
In 2007 Hartley also made his Formula Three debut in the Masters of Formula 3 at Zolder event, finishing 4th. This resulted in a test with A1 Team New Zealand and the role of the rookie driver for the series.
In 2008, Hartley competed in the British Formula 3 Championship for Carlin Motorsport winning five times and eventually finished the championship in third. He might have placed higher up, but for more retirements than his teammates Jaime Alguersuari and Oliver Turvey had. They each had two, while Hartley had six. He also competed in eight races in the Formula Three Euroseries for Carlin and RC Motorsport, and achieved two finishes in the points, although he was ineligible for points. In non-championship races, Hartley finished fifth at the Masters of Formula 3, and a sensational drive at the Macau Grand Prix to finish third, after crashing in the qualification race. He started 20th on the grid and recorded the fastest race lap.
He stayed with Carlin for the full F3 Euroseries in 2009, finishing eleventh despite missing two rounds due to Formula Renault 3.5 Series commitments. In that series, Hartley competed for the defending champion Tech 1 Racing team, and ended fifteenth in the championship.
He has been confirmed at Tech 1 for a full season of Formula Renault 3.5 in 2010, where he was partnered by Australian and fellow Red Bull Junior driver, Daniel Ricciardo. During the series' summer break it was announced that Hartley had been dropped from the Red Bull Junior Team. His seat was taken by British Formula 3 championship leader Jean-Éric Vergne.
Despite the loss of his Red Bull backing, Hartley made his GP2 Series début at Monza in September, replacing Vladimir Arabadzhiev at the Coloni team. He scored a point in the season finale at Yas Marina to place 27th in the championship.
For 2011, Hartley returned to Formula Renault 3.5, driving alongside Jan Charouz for the Gravity–Charouz Racing team. He also returned to GP2 for the eighth round of the series at Spa-Francorchamps, replacing Kevin Mirocha and driving alongside Johnny Cecotto Jr. in the Ocean Racing Technology team, for whom he had tested before the start of the season. He finished in fifth place in his first race with the team, and 19th in the overall championship.
Hartley began the 2012 season without a drive, but returned to Ocean for the second round of the championship in Bahrain in place of Jon Lancaster. After the two rounds in Bahrain, he was in turn replaced by Víctor Guerin. He finished 25th in the championship.
With no suitable single-seater drives available, Hartley joined the Murphy Prototypes sportscar team, which was competing in the LMP2 class in the European Le Mans Series. Following the cancellation of the second round of the ELMS championship (which would have been Hartley's début event) and the series' future in doubt, Murphy was one of several ELMS teams invited to compete as a guest entry in the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps, a round of the more prestigious FIA World Endurance Championship. Driving the team's Oreca 03-Nissan, Hartley finished tenth overall and third in the LMP2 class with teammates Warren Hughes and Jody Firth. The trio teamed up again for the 24 Hours of Le Mans, but retired from the race after completing 196 laps of the circuit.
In October 2017, Hartley was offered a drive in Formula One by Toro Rosso for the United States Grand Prix which was held in Austin. Hartley replaced Pierre Gasly, who was absent contesting the Super Formula Championship final. It was Hartley's F1 debut where he became the ninth New Zealander to race in Formula One.
In November 2018, Hartley was released from the Toro Rosso team.
 |
2017 Porsche 919 Hybrid Photo by Pietro De Grandi View photo of 2017 Porsche 919 Hybrid - 1.5MB |
