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Sato shone in British Formula Three, winning the championship in 2001. But his début season for Jordan in 2002, as Eddie Jordan tried in vain to court Honda into staying with them, was an accident-strewn disaster - at least until he scooped fifth place at his home Grand Prix.
Jordan lost their Japanese engine supply anyway so there was no need for him at the team in 2003. He joined Honda-supplied BAR as a test driver and stood in for Jacques Villeneuve when the Canadian quit the team late in the season.
Sato took Villeneuve’s place full-time in 2004 and with a competitive car under him scored his first podium at Indianapolis. But more often than not he was outclassed by Jenson Button.
Sato’s problems continued in 2005 - most disastrously when he took out Michael Schumacher at Spa-Francorchamps and Jarno Trulli at Suzuka, earning a disqualification for the latter.
But there was outcry in Japan when Honda, having taken over BAR, announced he would be dropped to make way for Rubens Barrichello.
That would probably have been the end for Sato’s F1 career but pressure from Japanese fans urged Honda to keep Sato in F1 somehow. A solution was found in the creation of Super Aguri, headed up by former Japanese driver Aguri Suzuki, a new team that would receive Honda engines from 2006 and be led by Sato.
As lead driver Sato continued to impress and disappoint in roughly equal measure. He carelessly crashed out in Indianapolis, but at the final round of the year in Interlagos he drove to a fine tenth.
In 2007 former Carlin F3 team mate Anthony Davidson joined him at Super Aguri. Sato broke the team’s duck and scored an excellent sixth in a chaotic race at Montreal, even passing Fernando Alonso’s McLaren. But in the second half of the season Davidson was visibly quicker.
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