Giancarlo Fisichella

Giancarlo Fisichella

Fisichella at the 2009 Italian Grand Prix
Date of birth	14 January 1973 (1973-01-14) (age 38)
Formula One World Championship career
Nationality	Italian
Active years	1996–2009
Teams	Minardi, Jordan, Benetton, Sauber, Renault, Force India Ferrari
Races	231 (229 starts)
Championships	0
Wins	3
Podiums	19
Career points	275
Pole positions	4
Fastest laps	2
First race	1996 Australian Grand Prix
First win	2003 Brazilian Grand Prix
Last win	2006 Malaysian Grand Prix
Last race	2009 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
2009 position	15th (8 pts)

24 Hours of Le Mans career
Participating years	2010
Teams	AF Corse
Best finish	16th
Class wins	0

Giancarlo Fisichella (born 14 January 1973 in Rome, Italy), also known as Fisico, Giano or Fisi, is an Italian racing driver. He has driven in Formula One for Minardi, Jordan, Benetton, Sauber, Renault, Force India and Ferrari in place of the injured Felipe Massa.^[1] He is Ferrari's reserve driver for 2010.

Fisichella has won three races in his career to date, the first of which was at the chaotic 2003 Brazilian Grand Prix, a race abandoned for safety reasons with 15 laps remaining. After much confusion regarding rules and technicalities (which lasted for several days) Fisichella was eventually declared the winner in the following week, and collected his trophy in an unorthodox ceremony at the following race. He was brought in to the Renault team to replace fellow Italian Jarno Trulli, and won his first race with the team in Australia in 2005. However, after that race it was his team-mate, the Spanish driver Fernando Alonso, that would win the greater share of races for Renault. Although highly rated as a driver, Fisichella was unable to keep pace with eventual champion Alonso, managing just one further race win since his debut. Outside of driving, he has backed his own GP2 team, FMS International.

Fisichella has three children, Carlotta and Christopher and Carolina, with his longtime domestic partner Luna Castellani (a former Italian showgirl). The couple married on October 10, 2009.^[2]

Contents 1 Early career 2 Formula One 2.1 1996: Minardi 2.2 1997: Jordan 2.3 1998–2001: Benetton 2.4 2002–2003: Jordan 2.5 2004: Sauber 2.6 2005–2007: Renault 2.7 2008–2009: Force India 2.7.1 2008 2.7.2 2009 2.8 2009 – Present: Ferrari 3 Sports cars 4 Racing record 4.1 Career summary 4.2 Complete Formula One results 5 References 6 External links

Early career

Like most current Formula One drivers, he began kart racing as a youngster in the Guidonia's Kart circuit. In 1992, he competed in the Italian Formula Three Championship, racing for the RC Motorsport team. He finished runner up in 1993, and in 1994 he won the championship, following race victories in Monaco and Macau. He left open-wheel racing briefly in 1995, driving for Alfa Romeo in the International Touring Car Championship.

Formula One

1996: Minardi

In 1996, he made the move to Formula One, making his debut for the Minardi team, after being the official test driver the previous season. However he did not complete the full season since Minardi required a driver who could bring funding to the team, and replaced Fisichella with Giovanni Lavaggi.

1997: Jordan

For 1997 he made the move to Eddie Jordan's eponymous team, where he drove alongside former F1 champion Michael Schumacher's brother Ralf, himself a former Formula Nippon champion. Fisichella gained his first podium finish at the 1997 Canadian Grand Prix, and went on to finish higher in the points standings than his team-mate. At Hockenheim a victory looked to be within reach for Fisichella, but a puncture and the performance of an on-form Gerhard Berger denied him the win. Fisichella was able to show his talent again at the rain-soaked Belgian Grand Prix in which he finished a commendable second behind Michael Schumacher. Following this race, the Benetton team signed him for 1998.

1998–2001: Benetton

However, the timing of this move was unfortunate. Following Renault's withdrawal from Formula One, Benetton would contest the 1998 season without "works" (factory-supplied) engines, instead using rebranded development versions of 1997 Renault engines. Despite not having the latest engines, Fisichella still managed second places at Montreal and Monaco, even being in contention for a victory in Canada until gearbox problems slowed him down. In Austria, Fisichella scored his first pole position, although an on-track clash with Jean Alesi during the race cost him any chance of a good result. He was then able to add only two more points to his total in the second half of the year as Benetton lost ground on their competition.

1999 proved to be a similarly inconsistent season for Giancarlo Fisichella. He did score some podium finishes, and again came close to a victory in the European Grand Prix, until he spun off whilst in the lead. This would prove to be his best chance of a victory for the next few seasons.

Fisichella's season was to follow a similar pattern in 2000. He again gained some surprise podium finishes early in the year, but Benetton's now unfortunately traditional poor second half of the season meant that he failed to score any more points. Since joining Benetton, Fisichella had comprehensively outperformed his Austrian team-mate Alexander Wurz, who would then leave the team to make way for British rookie Jenson Button in 2001. Renault had purchased the Benetton team by the start of the 2001 season, but their investment was too late to enable much progress with Benetton's uncompetitive 2001 car, and as a result, Fisichella was battling for much of the season with teams such as Minardi and Prost. However, the efforts of technical director Mike Gascoyne and his staff did result in improvements over the year, culminating in a 4-5 finish at the German Grand Prix and a third place finish for Fisichella at the Belgian race. Despite Fisichella gaining the team's best results that season and consistently outperforming Button, he left the team to rejoin Jordan for 2002.

2002–2003: Jordan

Fisichella managed to score just seven points for 2002, comfortably outpacing new teammate Takuma Sato, although the Jordan-Honda car of that year was never truly competitive. After Honda withdrew their engine supply, Jordan switched to Ford engines for the 2003 season, but the team were still unable to compete with the top teams on the grid. Despite this lack of performance, Fisichella won his first race at the Brazilian Grand Prix.

Battling with McLaren's Kimi Räikkönen amidst heavy rain and numerous crashes, Fisichella took the race lead on lap 54, soon before the race was red-flagged. However, he was demoted to second place on the podium, because (per regulations) Räikkönen was the race leader two laps prior to the red flag. Several days later, though, the FIA determined that Fisichella had already begun his 56th lap before the red flag, meaning that he, and not Räikkönen, had been leading the race two laps before its premature end, awarding the Italian his first F1 victory. For nearly two years (i.e. until his win in the 2005 Australian Grand Prix), Fisichella was the only F1 driver to have won a race without having stood atop the podium. He collected the winner's trophy at the next race at Imola. Fisichella's only other points finish of 2003 was to be a seventh place at Indianapolis.

2004: Sauber

Unhappy at the Jordan team's performance, Fisichella moved to Sauber in 2004 in the hope of greater results, and of using the team as a way of gaining access to, and a drive for, 2003 World Champions Ferrari, who supplied re-badged engines to the Sauber team. Fisichella drove well all year, comfortably outpacing team mate Felipe Massa for much of the season (scoring 22 championship points vs Massa's 12).

2005–2007: Renault

His strong performances prompted former Benetton-Renault team boss Flavio Briatore to re-sign him for the 2005 season as partner to the young Spanish driver Fernando Alonso. A win at in the season's opening race at Melbourne signalled the Formula One breakthrough that commentators had been predicting, but it proved to be something of a false dawn. A run of poor luck saw Fisichella fall behind his team mate in the championship standings, and at times the pair were achieving noticeably different lap times with the same equipment. It appeared that Fisichella simply did not have the pace to match Alonso.

The difference in pace between Fisichella and Alonso was noticeable, and while Alonso's metronomic consistency helped him win the 2005 championship, Fisichella's general bad luck was to cost him points finishes. He was overtaken and lost the lead on the final lap of the Japanese Grand Prix by McLaren driver Kimi Räikkönen, despite his race engineer urging him to avoid letting Räikkönen past. Nevertheless, his performances alongside Alonso throughout the season enabled Renault to win the World Constructors' Championship ahead of McLaren and Ferrari, the team that had won that title the previous six seasons.

2006 proved to be a similar season for Fisichella. Having won in Malaysia, putting in a strong performance to win from the pole position, he failed to maintain that pace for the upcoming races, and even failed to reach the top ten in qualifying for two races. This form, in addition to a penalty in Monaco for allegedly impeding David Coulthard, meant Fisichella was again unable to challenge his team mate Alonso for the drivers' Championship. Some strong results in the second half of the 2006 season, including finishing ahead of Alonso at the US Grand Prix, enabled Fisichella to obtain his best ever results: Fourth in the World Drivers' Championship with 72 points, one win, and five podium finishes. After finishing third in the 2006 Japanese Grand Prix, Fisichella dedicated the result to his best friend, Tonino Visciani, who died of a heart attack on the Thursday before the race.^[3]

In 2007 Giancarlo Fisichella became Renault's lead driver after the departure of Fernando Alonso. His team mate was the team's former test driver, the young Finn Heikki Kovalainen, who was replaced as test driver by Nelson Piquet, Jr.

Renault did not demonstrate the same level of pace as in previous seasons, which had seen them win successive World Championships. It remains unclear whether the difference was due to the change of tyre supplier from Michelin to Bridgestone, the lack of Fernando Alonso as a driver, or simply being outpaced in off-season development by the other top teams. Another possibility is that the team's wind tunnel was giving inaccurate data in late 2006 which affected the development of the 2007 car. This was cited by Pat Symonds in an issue of F1 Racing Magazine. In the early races, Fisichella obtained better results than rookie team mate Kovalainen, but in Canada and the USA it was the Finn who claimed the higher finishes. Fisichella was disqualified from the Canadian Grand Prix, along with Ferrari's Felipe Massa, for exiting the pit lane while the traffic light was showing red, the purpose of which is to prevent cars rejoining the race ahead of the safety car. He later stated that he had been busy avoiding other cars in the pit lane and had simply not noticed the red light. The Renault team seemed to have made significant progress in terms of pace by the Spanish Grand Prix, but a series of fuel rig problems meant that neither driver was able to capitalise on this apparent increase in performance. Fisichella crashed into the Super Aguri of Anthony Davidson at the 2007 Hungarian Grand Prix which broke his rear suspension and forced him to retire.

2008–2009: Force India

2008

With Renault signing Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet, Jr. Fisichella was announced as the number one driver alongside Adrian Sutil for the Force India F1 team for the 2008 season (This is the third stint for Fisichella at the former Jordan team) on January 10, 2008.^[4] In the 2008 Monaco Grand Prix, he became the 9th driver to join the '200' club for drivers to have competed in at least 200 Grands Prix. The only other active drivers in the club are Rubens Barrichello, who as of the 2008 Turkish Grand Prix is the most experienced F1 driver ever, and Jarno Trulli, who had his 200th start at Australia in 2009. David Coulthard, who retired from F1 after the 2008 season, had also competed in more than 200 Grands Prix.

Fisichella finished the season pointless, as did the Force India team. However, there were a few moments when he found himself in a points position, such as the Brazilian Grand Prix, where an early change to soft compound tyres and his wet-weather ability saw him climb as high as 3rd. On 17 October, Force India announced they would keep Fisichella for the 2009 season.^[5]

2009

With the new Force India VJM02 powered by a Mercedes-Benz engine, Fisichella qualified 18th (promoted to 15th after both Toyotas and Lewis Hamilton were demoted) on the grid for the 2009 curtain-opener at Australia. He finished 11th in the race itself. In Malaysia, he qualified 18th, and was classified in the same position, having spun off in the torrential rain that stopped the race on lap 33.

On 29 August 2009, making the most of some very effective technical upgrades from Force India, Fisichella recorded the team's first pole position at the Belgian Grand Prix. He went on to score Force India's first points in Formula One with a strong second place finish behind Ferrari's Kimi Räikkönen.

During that weekend, there were rumours that Fisichella might replace fellow Italian Luca Badoer and become a Ferrari driver, something that he admitted he always wanted to do.^[6] On 3 September 2009, an official press statement confirmed Fisichella would be released from Force India to drive for Ferrari at the Italian Grand Prix, his home race.^[7]

2009 – Present: Ferrari

Giancarlo Fisichella signed a contract as Ferrari's driver for the remainder of the 2009 season and reserve driver for 2010 on September 3, 2009.^[8] However, Fisichella has not ruled out continuing to race for another team in 2010, saying "if there is a good option to find another seat in another team it would be good". Beginning with the 2009 Italian Grand Prix, he replaced the injured Felipe Massa for the remainder of the 2009 season.

Fisichella will remain Ferrari's reserve driver for 2010 but is keen to keep racing for a different team. Fisichella admitted that Sauber was a strong option and was strongly linked to the team ^[9], however Fisichella's hopes of driving for Sauber in 2010 were ended when Pedro de la Rosa was confirmed as the team's second driver.^[10] Fisichella was also linked to a possible return to Force India but the team confirmed former team mate Adrian Sutil and fellow Italian Vitantonio Liuzzi. Fisichella will remain one of Ferrari's test drivers for 2010 along with fellow Italian Luca Badoer and Spaniard Marc Gené.

Sports cars

It has been announced that Fisichella will make his sports car racing debut in 2010 by driving a Ferrari in the Le Mans Series.^[11]

Racing record

Career summary

Season	Series	Team Name	Races	Poles	Wins	Points	Final Placing
1992	Italian Formula Three	Jolly Club	8	0	1	11	8th
1993	Italian Formula Three	Jolly Club	12	0	2	36	3rd
	Macau Grand Prix	RC Motorsport	1	0	0	N/A	NC
	Grand Prix de Monaco F3	Jolly Club	1	1	0	N/A	2nd
1994	Italian Formula Three	RC Motorsport	20	11	11	309	1st
	British Formula Three		1	0	0	10	16th
	Macau Grand Prix		1	1	0	N/A	NC
	Grand Prix de Monaco F3		1	1	1	N/A	1st
	Masters of Formula Three		1	0	0	N/A	9th
1995	Formula One	Minardi	Test driver
	International Touring Car Championship	Alfa Corse 2	10	0	0	37	10th
	Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft	Alfa Corse 2	12	0	0	30	15th
1996	Formula One	Minardi	8	0	0	0	NC
	Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft	Alfa Corse	24	0	0	139	6th
1997	Formula One	Jordan	17	0	0	20	8th
1998	Formula One	Benetton Renault	16	1	0	16	9th
1999	Formula One	Benetton Renault	16	0	0	13	9th
2000	Formula One	Benetton Renault	17	0	0	18	6th
2001	Formula One	Benetton Renault	17	0	0	8	11th
2002	Formula One	Jordan Honda	17	0	0	7	11th
2003	Formula One	Jordan Ford	16	0	1	12	12th
2004	Formula One	Sauber Petronas	18	0	0	22	11th
2005	Formula One	Renault	19	1	1	58	5th
2006	Formula One	Renault	18	1	1	72	4th
2007	Formula One	Renault	17	0	0	21	8th
2008	Formula One	Force India Ferrari	18	0	0	0	19th
2009	Formula One	Force India Mercedes	12	1	0	8	15th
		Ferrari	5	0	0	0
2010	Formula One	Ferrari	Test driver

Complete Formula One results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Entrant	Chassis	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	WDC	Points
1996	Minardi Team	Minardi M195B	Ford EDM2 3.0 V8 Ford EDM3 3.0 V8	AUS Ret	BRA	ARG	EUR 13	SMR Ret	MON Ret	ESP Ret	CAN 8	FRA Ret	GBR 11	GER	HUN	BEL	ITA	POR	JPN				NC	0
1997	Benson & Hedges Total Jordan Peugeot	Jordan 197	Peugeot A14 3.0 V10	AUS Ret	BRA 8	ARG Ret	SMR 4	MON 6	ESP 9	CAN 3	FRA 9	GBR 7	GER 11	HUN Ret	BEL 2	ITA 4	AUT 4	LUX Ret	JPN 7	EUR 11			8th	20
1998	Mild Seven Benetton Playlife	Benetton B198	Playlife GC37-01 3.0 V10	AUS Ret	BRA 6	ARG 7	SMR Ret	ESP Ret	MON 2	CAN 2	FRA 9	GBR 5	AUT Ret	GER 7	HUN 8	BEL Ret	ITA 8	LUX 6	JPN 8				9th	16
1999	Mild Seven Benetton Playlife	Benetton B199	Playlife FB01 3.0 V10	AUS 4	BRA Ret	SMR 5	MON 5	ESP 9	CAN 2	FRA Ret	GBR 7	AUT 12	GER Ret	HUN Ret	BEL 11	ITA Ret	EUR Ret	MAL 11	JPN 14				9th	13
2000	Mild Seven Benetton Playlife	Benetton B200	Playlife FB02 3.0 V10	AUS 5	BRA 2	SMR 11	GBR 7	ESP 9	EUR 5	MON 3	CAN 3	FRA 9	AUT Ret	GER Ret	HUN Ret	BEL Ret	ITA 11	USA Ret	JPN 14	MAL 9			6th	18
2001	Mild Seven Benetton Playlife	Benetton B201	Renault RS21 3.0 V10	AUS 13	MAL Ret	BRA 6	SMR Ret	ESP 14	AUT Ret	MON Ret	CAN Ret	EUR 11	FRA 11	GBR 13	GER 4	HUN Ret	BEL 3	ITA 10	USA 8	JPN 17			11th	8
2002	DHL Jordan Honda	Jordan EJ12	Honda RA002E 3.0 V10	AUS Ret	MAL 13	BRA Ret	SMR Ret	ESP Ret	AUT 5	MON 5	CAN 5	EUR Ret	GBR 7	FRA DNQ	GER Ret	HUN 6	BEL Ret	ITA 8	USA 7	JPN Ret			11th	7
2003	Benson & Hedges Jordan Ford	Jordan EJ13	Ford RS1 3.0 V10	AUS Ret	MAL Ret	BRA 1	SMR 15	ESP Ret	AUT Ret	MON 10	CAN Ret	EUR 12	FRA Ret	GBR Ret	GER 13	HUN Ret	ITA 10	USA 7	JPN Ret				12th	12
2004	Sauber Petronas	Sauber C23	Petronas 04A 3.0 V10	AUS 10	MAL 11	BHR 11	SMR 9	ESP 7	MON Ret	EUR 6	CAN 4	USA 9	FRA 12	GBR 6	GER 9	HUN 8	BEL 5	ITA 8	CHN 7	JPN 8	BRA 9		11th	22
2005	Mild Seven Renault F1 Team	Renault R25	Renault RS25 3.0 V10	AUS 1	MAL Ret	BHR Ret	SMR Ret	ESP 5	MON 12	EUR 6	CAN Ret	USA DNS	FRA 6	GBR 4	GER 4	HUN 9	TUR 4	ITA 3	BEL Ret	BRA 5	JPN 2	CHN 4	5th	58
2006	Mild Seven Renault F1 Team	Renault R26	Renault RS26 2.4 V8	BHR Ret	MAL 1	AUS 5	SMR 8	EUR 6	ESP 3	MON 6	GBR 4	CAN 4	USA 3	FRA 6	GER 6	HUN Ret	TUR 6	ITA 4	CHN 3	JPN 3	BRA 6		4th	72
2007	ING Renault F1 Team	Renault R27	Renault RS27 2.4 V8	AUS 5	MAL 6	BHR 8	ESP 9	MON 4	CAN DSQ	USA 9	FRA 6	GBR 8	EUR 10	HUN 12	TUR 9	ITA 12	BEL Ret	JPN 5	CHN 11	BRA Ret			8th	21
2008	Force India F1 Team	Force India VJM01	Ferrari 056 2.4 V8	AUS Ret	MAL 12	BHR 12	ESP 10	TUR Ret	MON Ret	CAN Ret	FRA 18	GBR Ret	GER 16	HUN 15	EUR 14	BEL 17	ITA Ret	SIN 14	JPN Ret	CHN 17	BRA 18		19th	0
2009	Force India F1 Team	Force India VJM02	Mercedes FO108W 2.4 V8	AUS 11	MAL 18	CHN 14	BHR 15	ESP 14	MON 9	TUR Ret	GBR 10	GER 11	HUN 14	EUR 12	BEL 2								15th	8
	Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro	Ferrari F60	Ferrari 056 2.4 V8													ITA 9	SIN 13	JPN 12	BRA 10	ABU 16

References

External links

• The official website for Giancarlo Fisichella
• Giancarlo Fisichella profile and statistics
• Giancarlo Fisichella statistics
• Giancarlo Fisichella profile

Sporting positions
Preceded by Gianantonio Pacchioni	Monaco Formula Three Race Winner 1994	Succeeded by Gianantonio Pacchioni
Preceded by Christian Pescatori	Italian Formula Three Champion 1994	Succeeded by Luca Rangoni
Preceded by Luca Badoer	Formula One Indoor Trophy winner 1996	Succeeded by Incumbent
Awards and achievements
Preceded by Luca di Montezemolo	Lorenzo Bandini Trophy 1998	Succeeded by Alexander Wurz

Force India F1 Team Personnel: Vijay Mallya | Michiel Mol | Otmar Szafnauer Former personnel: Mike Gascoyne | James Key | Colin Kolles 2010 drivers: 14. Adrian Sutil | 15. Vitantonio Liuzzi 2011 drivers: 14. TBA | 15. TBA 2010 test drivers: Paul di Resta 2011 test drivers: TBA Former drivers: Giancarlo Fisichella Formula One cars: VJM01 | VJM02 | VJM03

Scuderia Ferrari Founder: Enzo Ferrari President: Luca Cordero di Montezemolo Current personnel: Mario Almondo · Luca Baldisserri · Aldo Costa · Stefano Domenicali · Luca Marmorini · Rob Smedley · Chris Dyer · Andrea Stella · Massimo Rivola · Nicholas Tombazis · Pat Fry Former personnel: John Barnard · Ross Brawn · Gustav Brunner · Rory Byrne · Carlo Chiti · Gioacchino Colombo · Cesare Fiorio · Mauro Forghieri · Vittorio Jano · Aurelio Lampredi · Harvey Postlethwaite · Gilles Simon · Nigel Stepney · Jean Todt 2010 drivers: 7. Felipe Massa · 8. Fernando Alonso 2011 drivers: 5. Fernando Alonso · 6. Felipe Massa 2010 test drivers:  Giancarlo Fisichella ·  Luca Badoer 2011 test drivers:  Jules Bianchi Former drivers World Champions:  Alberto Ascari ·  Juan Manuel Fangio ·  Mike Hawthorn ·  Phil Hill ·  Niki Lauda ·  Kimi Räikkönen ·  Jody Scheckter ·   Michael Schumacher ·  John Surtees Formula One cars: 125 · 212 · 166 · 275 · 340 · 375 · 500 · 553 · 625 · 555 · D50 · 801 · 246 · 156 · 158 · 1512 · 312 · 312B · 312T · 126C · 156/85 · F1/86 · F1/87 · 640 · 641 · 642 · 643 · F92A · F93A · 412T · F310 · F300 · F399 · F1-2000 · F2001 · F2002 · F2003-GA · F2004 · F2005 · 248 F1 · F2007 · F2008 · F60 · F10