CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 4

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Toyota driver Timo Glock is one of the racers to have competed in both Formula 1 and Champ Cars. So is the man who inadvertently gave Michael Schumacher his F1 break.

Read about them and more in today’s instalment of CART drivers who raced in F1.

Bertrand Gachot

Midway through 1991 Gachot looked like a man who had paid his dues in Formula 1 and was now on an upward trajectory with a promising young team. Then he got into a row with a London taxi driver, sprayed CS gas in the man’s face, was sent to prison, and Michael Schumacher nabbed his place at Jordan for the next Grand Prix…

This was a blow for Gachot, who’d driven for such back-of-the-grid regulars as Onyx, Rial and Coloni. After losing his Jordan drive he found himself back among the likes of Lola, Venturi and Pacific.

His 84 F1 appearances yielded 47 starts and a best finish of fifth, although he did give Jordan their first race fastest lap at Hundary in 1991. He made his sole Champ Car start in 1993 with Dick Simon Racing at Toronto, finishing 12th.

Bruno Giacomelli

Giacomelli showed real promise early in his Grand Prix career, especially when he put his Alfa Romeo on pole position at Watkins Glen in 1980 and led 31 laps. But the team became gradually less competitive and he left them in 1983 to join Toleman. He scored just one point all year, at Brands Hatch, and quit to join Champ Cars.

Two years in the series saw him register a best finish of fifth at Meadowlands in 1985. Surprisingly he returned to F1 in 1990 for seven fruitless attempts at getting Life into a Grand Prix. He never even got their woeful machine beyond pre-qualifying. Incidentally, his lengthy seven-year gap between consecutive F1 starts is dwarfed by that of another ex-Champ Car driver who will appear later in this series…

Timo Glock

One of two active F1 drivers to have raced in Champ Car (the other being Sebastien Bourdais), Glock made a brief sojourn into the series between his first F1 appearance in 2004 and his return this year.

After making a few F1 starts for Jordan in 2004 Glock found himself out in the cold and briefly turned to racing in Champ Cars. It was at Montreal, the scene of his F1 debut (on which he scored points), where he had his best Champ Car result for Rocketsports. He finished second after being forced to give up the lead after the stewards deemed he had used an illegal defensive manoeuvre.

Glock left Champ Car and returned to Europe and got back into F1 via GP2, winning the championship last year. He is yet to score for Toyota this season.

Read more about Timo Glock: Timo Glock biography

Olivier Grouillard

In the years before backmarkers had to scamper out of the way of the approaching leaders, Grouillard made himself the enemy of the front-runners by failing to take account of his mirrors which were often full of an Ayrton Senna or Alain Prost.

He made 41 starts between 1989 and 1992 driving for Ligier, Osella, AGS, Fondmetal and Tyrrell. After leaving F1 he made 11 Champ Car starts for Indy Regency Racing but never finished in the top ten.

Roberto Guerrero

Colombian Guerrero had a long career in America following two seasons in F1 with the uncompetitive Ensign and Theodore teams.

On switching to Champ Car he was named CART and Indianapolis 500 rookie of the year. In 1987 he was running third in the championship for Granatelli Racing, having won at Phoenix and Mid-Ohio, but a serious crash left him in a coma for 17 days.

He never won again in Champ Car although he remained competitive, taking pole position for the 1992 Indianapolis 500 before spinning off disastrously on the pace lap. When Champ Car and Indy Car split he joined the new Indy Car series and competed in that until 2000.

Mauricio Gugelmin

A friend of Ayrton Senna, Gugelmin raced for Leyton House from 1988 to 1991. But during the team’s occasional peaks in form it was team mate Ivan Capelli who starred. A year in the unreliable Jordan-Yamaha in 1992 left him without any points and he switched to Champ Car.

After seasons with Dick Simon and Chip Ganassi, Gugelmin joined PacWest for 1995 and stayed there until his retirement in 2001. The team joined the front runners in 1997 and Gugelmin narrowly lost a victory at Detroit, running out of fuel on the last lap. He scored his first and only win at Vancouver that year, but consistent points finishes left him fourth in the championship.

Following the high of 1997 the team slumped in form. In 2001 Gugelmin suffered a massive crash at Texas Motor Speedway, hitting the wall twice with impacts of 66.2G and 113.1G. That race was cancelled after it emerged the drivers were blacking out due to unusually high G-loadings. At the end of a year which had seen his accident, Alessandro Zanardi’s horror crash at Lausitzring, and the loss of his third son to cerebral palsy, Gugelmin retired.

Naoki Hattori

Two unsuccessful attempts to pre-qualify for Coloni in 1991 are all Hattori has to show for his F1 efforts. In Champ Car he at least made it as far as raceday on eight occasions in 1999.

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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