|
Neel Jani |
|
|---|---|
| Nationality | Swiss |
| Champ Car # | 21 |
| Current team | PKV Racing |
| Race starts | 14 |
| Series Championships | 0 |
| Wins | 0 |
| Podium finishes | 3 |
| Pole positions | 0 |
| First Champ Car race | 2007 Las Vegas Grand Prix |
| Last Champ Car race | 2007 Gran Premio Tecate |
| 24 Hours of Le Mans career | |
|---|---|
| Participating years | 2009 - |
| Teams | Speedy Racing Team Sebah, Rebellion Racing |
| Best finish | 6th (2011) |
| Class wins | 0 |
Neel Jani (born 8 December 1983 in Rorschach, Switzerland) is a Swiss race car driver of Indian origin. He has achieved his greatest success driving for A1 Team Switzerland in A1 Grand Prix, helping them win the 2007-2008 title and finishing runner-up in 2005-06 and 2008-09. He has been also a GP2 Series race-winner and Formula One tester. Jani currently competes in sports car racing with Rebellion Racing's LMP1 Lola-Toyota.
Contents |
Jani's career started in karting in 1998 where he stayed for two years before moving up to Formula Renault 2000 Eurocup in 2001. In the same year, he also raced some races in Italian Formula Renault. He stayed in both for 2002, again only racing part of the Italian Formula Renault season. In 2003, he moved to Formula Renault V6 Eurocup, driving for the Jenzer team. In that year, he finished second by only four points in the championship with Jenzer Motorsport. In 2004, he again raced in the Formula Renault V6 Eurocup but changed team, running with the French team DAMS, stating in the Swiss press, "This year, it is win or nothing." He finished fourth in the championship that year, while his old team, Jenzer Motorsport finished second with their rookie driver Ryan Sharp.
In 2005, he raced in the GP2 Series with Racing Engineering alongside Borja Garcia who he generally outperformed. He won two races, at the Hungaroring and at Monza. He also managed to lead most of the Nürburgring race in a clearly slower car with some effective defensive driving.
In 2006, he replaced injured Nicolas Lapierre in the Silverstone and Magny-Cours races for English race team Arden. By doing this, he also secured his place in the record books, being the only person to ever drive in both GP2 and F1 on the same day.
He then raced in the new A1 Grand Prix series, representing his home nation with A1 Team Switzerland. In the inaugural season of A1GP, the team earned the silver medal for second place, with Jani consistently finishing on the podium, including a win at the Dubai Autodrome during the Sprint Race of the 2005-06 A1 Grand Prix of Nations, United Arab Emirates.
After missing the first two rounds of the 2006-07 season in favour Sébastien Buemi, Jani would win another Sprint Race, during the 2006-07 A1 Grand Prix of Nations, Malaysia.
Jani drove all the races for Switzerland in the 2007-08 season, taking the championship with four wins and 168 points. The team finished second in the 2008-09 season, again with Jani ever-present.
He was linked to a reserve F1 seat with the Sauber team. In 2004 however, he moved back to GP2 the following year. In December 2005 he was confirmed as Scuderia Toro Rosso's third driver, alongside race drivers Scott Speed and Vitantonio Liuzzi, a role he held throughout the 2006 season, before departing to pursue a Champ Car career. For the 2008 F1 season, Neel was linked with the test driving role at Red Bull Racing. As his father is from India, Jani was linked to the proposed Indian-backed buyout of BMW Sauber[1] but this did not succeed. In early 2010 he tested for Force India and was rumoured to be involved with the team in 2010. However Force India have since signed Mercedes driver Paul di Resta as their test and reserve driver.
For 2007, Jani drove for the PKV Racing team in the Champ Car World Series.[2] He ended the series in ninth place with a total of 231 points. After choosing to focus on the 2007-2008 A1GP season rather than stay in ChampCar for 2008.,[3] the series was absorbed by the IRL.
In 2010, Jani and Nicolas Prost raced a Lola-Judd LMP1 at the Le Mans Series and 24 Hours of Le Mans, finishing 2nd at Algarve and 5th at Silverstone. Also, he raced the second half of the FIA GT1 season for Matech in a Ford GT, finishing 7th in a championship race and 8th in other two.
In the last quarter of 2011, Jani joined the inaugural i1 Super Series as an Indian International driver.
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)
| Year | Entrant | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | DC | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005–06 | Switzerland | GBR SPR 9 |
GBR FEA Ret |
GER SPR 2 |
GER FEA 5 |
POR SPR 3 |
POR FEA 2 |
AUS SPR 6 |
AUS FEA 3 |
MYS SPR 2 |
MYS FEA 2 |
UAE SPR 1 |
UAE FEA Ret |
RSA SPR 3 |
RSA FEA 2 |
IDN SPR 5 |
IDN FEA 5 |
MEX SPR 2 |
MEX FEA 3 |
USA SPR |
USA FEA |
CHN SPR |
CHN FEA |
2nd | 121 |
| 2006–07 | NED SPR |
NED FEA |
CZE SPR |
CZE FEA |
BEI SPR 9 |
BEI FEA Ret |
MYS SPR 1 |
MYS FEA 4 |
IDN SPR 10 |
IDN FEA 8 |
NZL SPR |
NZL FEA |
AUS SPR |
AUS FEA |
RSA SPR 5 |
RSA FEA 4 |
MEX SPR |
MEX FEA |
SHA SPR |
SHA FEA |
GBR SPR |
GBR SPR |
8th | 50 | |
| 2007–08 | NED SPR 5 |
NED FEA 3 |
CZE SPR 8 |
CZE FEA 3 |
MYS SPR 1 |
MYS FEA 1 |
ZHU SPR 2 |
ZHU FEA 6 |
NZL SPR Ret |
NZL FEA 13 |
AUS SPR 10 |
AUS FEA 2 |
RSA SPR 3 |
RSA FEA 1 |
MEX SPR 3 |
MEX FEA 19 |
SHA SPR 1 |
SHA FEA 5 |
GBR SPR 4 |
GBR SPR 3 |
1st | 168 | |||
| 2008–09 | NED SPR 5 |
NED FEA Ret |
CHN SPR 4 |
CHN FEA 4 |
MYS SPR 1 |
MYS FEA Ret |
NZL SPR 2 |
NZL FEA 1 |
RSA SPR 3 |
RSA FEA 1 |
POR SPR 15 |
POR FEA 1 |
GBR SPR 8 |
GBR SPR 3 |
2nd | 95 |
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)
| Year | Entrant | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | DC | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005 | Racing Engineering | SMR FEA 6 |
SMR SPR 15 |
ESP FEA 4 |
ESP SPR 5 |
MON FEA Ret |
EUR FEA 6 |
EUR SPR 13 |
FRA FEA 5 |
FRA SPR 4 |
GBR FEA 5 |
GBR SPR 6 |
GER FEA Ret |
GER SPR 22 |
HUN FEA 1 |
HUN SPR 4 |
TUR FEA Ret |
TUR SPR Ret |
ITA FEA 7 |
ITA SPR 1 |
BEL FEA 16 |
BEL SPR 18 |
BHR FEA 16 |
BHR SPR 13 |
7th | 48 |
| 2006 | Arden International | VAL FEA |
VAL SPR |
SMR FEA |
SMR SPR |
EUR FEA |
EUR SPR |
ESP FEA |
ESP SPR |
MON FEA |
GBR FEA Ret |
GBR SPR Ret |
FRA FEA 11 |
FRA SPR 7 |
GER FEA |
GER SPR |
HUN FEA |
HUN SPR |
TUR FEA |
TUR SPR |
ITA FEA |
ITA SPR |
25th | 0 |
(key)
| Yr | Entrant | Chassis | Engine | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | WDC | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2006 | Scuderia Toro Rosso | Toro Rosso STR1 | Cosworth V10 | BHR TD |
MAL TD |
AUS TD |
SMR TD |
EUR TD |
ESP TD |
MON TD |
GBR TD |
CAN TD |
USA TD |
FRA TD |
GER TD |
HUN TD |
TUR TD |
ITA TD |
CHN TD |
JPN TD |
BRA TD |
- | - |
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position, races in italics indicate fastest race lap)
| Year | Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | Rank | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2007 | PKV Racing | LVG Ret |
LBH 7 |
HOU Ret |
POR 12 |
CLE 3 |
MTT 6 |
TOR 2 |
EDM 9 |
SJO 2 |
ROA 10 |
ZOL 8 |
ASN 5 |
SRF 8 |
MXC 9 |
9th | 231 |
| Year | Team | Car | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | Pos | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Matech Competition | Ford | ABU QR |
ABU CR |
SIL QR |
SIL CR |
BRN QR |
BRN CR |
PRI QR |
PRI CR |
SPA QR 20 |
SPA CR 14 |
NÜR QR 8 |
NÜR CR 16 |
ALG QR 20 |
ALG CR 12 |
NAV QR 4 |
NAV CR 7 |
INT QR 7 |
INT CR 8 |
SAN QR 17 |
SAN CR 8 |
33rd | 14 |
| Year | Class | No | Tyres | Car | Team | Co-Drivers | Laps | Pos. | Class Pos. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2009 | LMP1 | 13 | M | Lola B08/60 Aston Martin 6.0L V12 |
Speedy Racing Team Sebah Automotive |
Andrea Belicchi Nicolas Prost |
342 | 14th | 12th |
| 2010 | LMP1 | 12 | M | Lola B10/60 Rebellion 5.5L V10 |
Rebellion Racing | Nicolas Prost Marco Andretti |
175 | DNF | DNF |
| 2011 | LMP1 | 12 | M | Lola B10/60 Toyota RV8KLM 3.4L V8 |
Rebellion Racing | Nicolas Prost Jeroen Bleekemolen |
338 | 6th | 6th |
| Sporting positions | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Inaugural |
Formula Lista Junior Champion 2000 |
Succeeded by Ken Allemann |
| Preceded by Nico Hülkenberg Christian Vietoris (Team Germany) |
A1 Grand Prix Champion (Team Switzerland) 2007-08 |
Succeeded by Adam Carroll (Team Ireland) |
|
|||||||||||||