Christijan Albers

Christijan Albers Born (1979-04-16) 16 April 1979 Eindhoven, North Brabant, Netherlands Formula One World Championship career Nationality Dutch Active years 2005–2007 Teams Minardi, Midland, Spyker Entries 46 Championships 0 Wins 0 Podiums 0 Career points 4 Pole positions 0 Fastest laps 0 First entry 2005 Australian Grand Prix Last entry 2007 British Grand Prix Christijan Albers Le Mans Series career Debut season 2009 Current team Kolles Starts 5 Wins 0 Poles 0 Fastest laps 0 Previous series 2008 2005–07 2001–04, 2008 2001–02, 2004 2000 1999 1998–99 1998–99 1997 American Le Mans Series Formula One DTM Formula One testing International Formula 3000 Belcar British F3 German F3 Formula Ford 1800 Benelux Championship titles 1999 1997 German F3 Formula Ford 1800 Benelux

Christijan Albers ( Christijan Albers ) (born 16 April 1979 in Eindhoven) is a Dutch professional racing driver. After success in the DTM he drove in Formula One from 2005 until the 2007 British Grand Prix, shortly after which he was dropped by the Spyker F1 team.^[1] In 2008, he returned to the DTM series as a driver for the Audi Futurecom TME team. Albers acted as Team Principal and CEO of the Caterham F1 Team from July to September 2014 after it was acquired by new team owners.^[2][3]

Personal

Christijan is the son of former rallycross ace and Porsche 911 Carrera campaigner André Albers, who won the 1979 Dutch International Rallycross Championship (GT Division). They are not related to their compatriot Marcel Albers, who was killed in a British Formula Three accident at Thruxton in 1992.

Christijan is married to Liselore Kooijman. Their wedding took place on 11 November 2006 in Amsterdam.^[4] He resides in Monaco.

Early career

Albers began kart racing at a young age, winning the Dutch National championship in 1997. That same year, he was crowned Formula Ford 1800 champion in both Netherlands and Belgium. He also participated in the Renault Megane Marlboro Masters series. In 1998, he moved up to the German Formula Three series, winning the championship in 1999 with six wins and ten poles.

In 2000, Albers raced in the International Formula 3000 championship as team-mate to Mark Webber. He failed to score a point, but team boss Paul Stoddart later signed him again. He also raced in European Formula Racing.

DTM

Beginning in 2001, Albers raced in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters for Mercedes-Benz, and graduated from a privately run team to the works AMG outfit in 2003 after the departure from the series of Uwe Alzen. He was instantly a front-runner, finishing runner-up in 2003 with a season-high four wins, and challenging DTM veteran and multiple champion Bernd Schneider for the title all the way up to the final race. In 2004 he again challenged for the championship lead for the most of the season but eventually finished third.

Formula One

Minardi (2005)

Albers driving for Minardi at the 2005 Canadian Grand Prix.

While racing in the DTM, Albers continued to be a test and reserve driver for Minardi's Formula One interests, and also drove the team's two-seater Formula One cars. In November 2004, he set the fastest time at a Misano di Gera d'Adda Minardi test session. He was chosen by the team to drive in the Formula One World Championship in 2005. In the 2005 United States Grand Prix he gained his first championship points with a fifth-place finish, in a race where only six drivers started.

Midland/Spyker F1 (2006–2007)

Albers driving the Midland M16 during the 2006 United States Grand Prix.

On 31 October 2005 Albers was confirmed as Midland's first official Formula One driver. Midland, the renamed Jordan team, made their debut in the 2006 Formula One season.

Albers started the 2006 season well, out-pacing Midland teammate Tiago Monteiro. However, during the first few races, Midland found themselves battling with the Super Aguri team, particularly Takuma Sato. At the 2006 San Marino Grand Prix, Albers found himself being crashed into by Yuji Ide and sent into a series of spectacular rolls. Fortunately, he was unharmed. Ide was reprimanded by the race stewards for his part in the incident. Ide also had his Super Licence revoked for severe dangerous driving.

Albers driving at Silverstone after Spyker's purchase of the team.

Albers driving for Spyker F1 at the 2007 British Grand Prix.

After initial confusion over Albers' plans for 2007 after the takeover of MF1 by Spyker Cars, it was eventually confirmed that he would be driving for the Spyker F1 team in 2007.

It was later found out that Albers signed a contract with Midland F1 to remain with the team prior to the sale to Spyker. Albers' personal sponsors had major influences in Spyker buying the Midland F1 team.^[5]

In early 2007 he was outperformed by rookie team-mate Adrian Sutil. At Magny-Cours he ignored the lollipop telling him not to leave the pits during a pitstop, driving off with part of the fuel rig still attached. Albers expressed relief that nobody was hurt,^[6] but he received a €5,000 penalty for dangerous driving. Spyker technical director Mike Gascoyne commented that he was mystified by the mistake,^[7] and Niki Lauda described the incident as the stupidest thing he had ever seen in F1.^[8]

On 10 July 2007 he was released from his Spyker contract, due to a lack of sponsorship money, which would have compromised the team's development programme. Team owner Michiel Mol described it as "one of the toughest decisions of my career".^[1][9] His replacement for the 2007 European Grand Prix was former Spyker test driver Markus Winkelhock.^[10] Sakon Yamamoto then raced for Spyker for the rest of the year.

Albers returned with the Spyker team for the Rotterdam street racing event in the Netherlands, on the 18 / 19 August.^[11]

Team principal at Caterham F1 (2014)

On 2 July 2014 Tony Fernandes sold the Caterham F1 Team to a consortium of Swiss-Middle Eastern investors. Subsequently, team principal Cyril Abiteboul stepped down and Albers was given his position in the team by the consortium. He ran the team on a day-to-day basis until Caterham collapsed following the 2014 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.^[12]

Return to DTM

Albers driving an Audi at Norisring in 2008.

Christijan Albers returned to the DTM-series in December 2007 as the Dutchman was invited by the Audi-team of Futurecom TME for a week of testing in Jerez de la Frontera.^[13] He tested for this team again on the Mugello Circuit in early March.

Christijan Albers was confirmed as a race driver for the Futurecom TME race team for 2008. He raced alongside Katherine Legge in a 2006 Specification Audi A4 DTM.^[14]

Albers is the Netherlands' most successful driver in the DTM series, finishing as runner-up in the 2003 championship.

Sportscar racing

It was announced on 9 October 2008 that Albers would be racing with Audi Sport North America in the American Le Mans Series. He piloted the #1 R10 TDI, partnered with Emanuele Pirro at Laguna Seca, the ALMS' final round. This was another step by Audi to bring youth to their Le Mans programs, following Marcel Fässler's two races in the R10. He finished this race in second place behind the #2 car from the same team.

He moved into the Le Mans Series for the 2009 season, moving to the customer Audi team, run by Colin Kolles.

Racing record

Career summary

Complete International Formula 3000 results

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

Complete DTM results

(key)

• † — Retired, but was classified as he completed 90% of the winner's race distance.

Complete Formula One results

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

Complete American Le Mans Series results

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2009	Kolles	Christian Bakkerud Giorgio Mondini	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	360	9th	9th
2010	Kolles	Christian Bakkerud Oliver Jarvis	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	331	DNF	DNF

Complete Le Mans Series results

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Christijan Albers.

• Official website
• Christijan Albers career summary at DriverDB.com

Caterham F1 Team
Founder Tony Fernandes Noted personnel Cyril Abiteboul Christijan Albers Riad Asmat Finbarr O'Connell Mike Gascoyne John Iley Colin Kolles Steve Nielsen Manfredi Ravetto Mark Smith Graham Watson Noted drivers Heikki Kovalainen Vitaly Petrov Charles Pic Giedo van der Garde Marcus Ericsson Kamui Kobayashi André Lotterer Will Stevens Formula One cars CT01 CT03 CT05 Related Caterham Group Caterham Racing GP2 Team