Arden International

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United Kingdom Arden International
Full name Arden International Motorsport
Founded 1997
Base United Kingdom Banbury, United Kingdom
Founder/s Christian Horner
Garry Horner
Team principal/s Christian Horner
Garry Horner
Technical director Julian Rouse
Race drivers 16. Austria René Binder[1]
17. Brazil André Negrão[2]
GP2 Series record
Debut 2005
Races competed 167
Teams' Championships 0
Drivers' Championships 0
Race victories 15
Pole positions 6
Fastest laps 9
Other Series
Current Series GP3 Series
Formula Renault 3.5 Series
Former Series GP2 Asia Series
Formula 3000
Italian Formula 3000
A1 Grand Prix
Drivers' Titles 2003 Formula 3000 (Wirdheim)
2004 Formula 3000 (Liuzzi)
2012 GP3 Series (Evans)
2013 GP3 Series (Kvyat)
Teams' Titles 2000 Italian Formula 3000
2002 Formula 3000
2003 Formula 3000
2004 Formula 3000

Arden International is a multiple formula racing team created and run by Christian Horner, Red Bull Racing's F1 team principal. It currently runs teams in the GP2 Series, GP3 Series and the Formula Renault 3.5 series.

It has been competing since 1997 and has raced in Formula 3000 series, the Italian Formula 3000 series, and the A1 GP series for Great Britain.

Due to the Arden's strong business connections and sponsorship, and because Horner is team principal at Red Bull Racing, the team often signs Red Bull Junior Team drivers as a way to pave forward future F1 drivers. Many drivers have been Red Bull Juniors, including Michael Ammermüller, Neel Jani, Adrian Zaugg, Filipe Albuquerque, Sébastien Buemi, Lewis Williamson and António Félix da Costa.

History

Formula 3000

Initially created to raise up Horner's career in 1997, in the winter of 1998 family friend David Richards had been approached by Russian oil company Lukoil to enable them to enter motorsports sponsorship. As entries to F3000 were restricted, Richards agreed a deal with Horner that Prodrive would take a 50% stake in Arden, in return for Horner becoming team manager. As a result the team signed Viktor Maslov as a driver under the Lukoil deal from 1999. The team started off poorly, and didn't have the pace to qualify for many races.

At the end of 1999, Richards sold a stake in proDrive to Apax Partners, who didn't want to continue in F3000. Horner hence exercised the option to buy back the Prodrive stake, although to this day Arden are based at and use premises rented from Prodrive. As the years went on, the team began to reap in the results and was the best team of Formula 3000 in its last 3 years, showing new talents to motorsport world like Darren Manning, Tomáš Enge, Björn Wirdheim and Vitantonio Liuzzi.

Björn Wirdheim in 2003 racing at Hungary

The team won the constructors title in 2002, 2003 and 2004. During those years, Wirdheim won the drivers championship in 2003, and Luizzi won it in 2004.

During the teams 8 years in the series, it has scored 359 points, won 16 races and achieved 20 pole positions.

Italian Formula 3000

The team joined the Italian Formula 3000 series for 1999 and 2000. Their first season was poor with only one point to their name, but the 2000 season went significantly better, with Warren Hughes taking two wins, one pole position and three fastest laps for the team, and Darren Manning taking one win, one pole and one fastest lap too. The team finished with Hughes second in the championship, and the team winning it outright 51 points.

A1 GP

Arden operated A1 Team Great Britain in the first season of the A1GP series for 2005-2006. The team fared well in their first season, collecting 8 podium finishes and a single pole position, leaving the team 3rd in the championship with 97 points overall.

GP2

In 2005, the F3000 series was rebranded as the GP2 Series, Arden stayed on for the new series and achieved second place in the teams' championship with Heikki Kovalainen and Nicolas Lapierre, and second place in the Drivers' Championship with Kovalainen, who had 5 wins, 4 pole positions and a fastest lap to his name.

In 2006, Arden competed in GP2 with Lapierre and the rookie Michael Ammermüller (Neel Jani acted as a substitute for Lapierre when the latter was injured in the race at Monaco). This year, Arden suffered a significant drop in performance, and had only 57 points to show and a single win from Ammermüller, compared to the previous season's 126. Overall the team came fourth in the championship.

For 2007, Arden signed Bruno Senna, nephew of triple F1 champion Ayrton Senna, and A1 Team South Africa driver Adrian Zaugg. Zaugg was replaced for the final round of the season by Filipe Albuquerque. This season was even worse for the team compared to the previous year, only managing 42 points which resulted in a seventh-placed finish in the teams' championship, with Senna finishing ninth overall in the drivers' championship.

For 2008 and the newly founded Asia Series, the team was renamed Trust Team Arden, after its Dutch title sponsor Trust. The duo of Red Bull junior driver Sébastien Buemi and Yelmer Buurman was its race line-up for both championships. For the Asia Series, Adam Khan raced for the first two rounds before being replaced by Buurman. The overall result in the Asia Series was the team finishing second in the championship, with 50 points and one win, and Buemi finishing second in the drivers' championship. Mid-season in the main series, Buurman was replaced by ART Grand Prix outcast Luca Filippi. The season went slightly better than the previous one with the team picking up 50 points, enough to take sixth place, and Buemi picked up two race victories to finish sixth overall in the drivers' championship.

Mortara leading at the race in Turkey

Arden again took part in the Asia Series for the 2008–09 season, signing Luiz Razia and Mika Mäki. For the second round of the championship, held at the Dubai Autodrome, Mäki was replaced by Renger van der Zande, who was subsequently replaced for the rest of the season by Edoardo Mortara. Razia scored the team's only win of the campaign, which allowed Arden to finish sixth in the teams' championship. For the 2009 main series season, the team signed F3 frontrunners Sergio Pérez and Mortara. This was also another poor season for the team, as it finished well down the order in eighth place overall with only Mortara managing a single win.

For the 2009-10 Asia Series season, Arden signed Charles Pic and Rodolfo González. After the first round, González was replaced by Javier Villa for the rest of the season. This was the team's most successful outing in the Asia Series, with an end result of 37 points and second in the teams' championship. Villa finished fourth overall in the drivers' championship with 19 points, and Pic finished fifth with a single race victory. For the 2010 main series, the team kept Pic and resigned González. However, the success from the Asia Series did not quite continue into the main series as the team eventually finished seventh with one win, courtesy of Pic. Arden finished with fewer points than in 2009, but still managed to beat the previous teams' championship result of eighth position.

Jolyon Palmer driving at Monza in 2011.

For the 2011 GP2 Asia Series and 2011 GP2 Main Series seasons, the team signed Josef Král and Jolyon Palmer.[3] The year was the team's worst so far in its GP2 history, as neither driver managed a win, pole or fastest lap in either series, and the team ended up finishing tenth in the Asia series and eleventh in the main series.

As the GP2 Asia Series had joined together with the GP2 main series in 2012, there were no longer two separate series. The team signed former 2008–09 Asia season driver Luiz Razia and former MW Arden GP3 sister team driver Simon Trummer for the 2012 season. Razia won the feature race of the first round in Malaysia, picked up two 2nd place finishes during the two Bahrain rounds, and won again at Catalunya, Valencia and Silverstone. He finished the season as runner-up to champion Davide Valsecchi, whilst Trummer had a best race finish of seventh place to take 23rd in the drivers' championship. Arden finished third in the team's championship; its best result since 2005.

GP3

Australia MW Arden
Full name Mark Webber Arden
Founded 2010
Base United Kingdom Banbury, United Kingdom
Founder/s Christian Horner
Mark Webber
Team principal/s Christian Horner
Mark Webber
Engineering Head position Jonathan Davenport
Technical director Julian Rouse
Race drivers 4. Romania Robert Vișoiu[4]
5. Switzerland Patric Niederhauser[5]
6. TBA
GP3 Series record
Debut 2010
Races competed 64
Teams' Championships 0
Drivers' Championships 2
Race victories 11
Pole positions 10
Fastest laps 11

From 2010 onwards, they have operated a GP3 Series team with Mark Webber, the team is called MW Arden. This builds on the fact that Mark Webber races for Red Bull Racing, which is run by Arden Team Owner and Team Principal of Red Bull Christian Horner. They signed Michael Christensen, Miki Monrás and Leonardo Cordeiro for their debut season. Their first venture into the new series proved difficult as they only accumulate 18 points for the whole season with 2 fastest laps, leaving them 9th in the championship.

For 2011, the team completely refreshed their line up by signing Mitch Evans, Simon Trummer and Lewis Williamson. The season overshadowed the previous as the team came second overall in the constructors championship with 69 points, and both Williamson and Evans scoring 1 win each and coming 8th and 9th in the drivers championship respectively. This would also be the season where the team picked up its first pole positions with 2 from Evans and 1 from Williamson.

For 2012, they retained Evans, and partnered him with David Fumanelli and Matias Laine. Evans former team mates Simon Trummer and Lewis Williamson had moved to the GP2 sister team, and the new Formula Renault team Arden Caterham respectively. At the first round in Spain, Evans won the feature race. At the third round in Valencia, Evans managed to collect pole position and went on to win another feature race.

Evans went on to win the championship in the 2012 season.

Formula Renault 3.5

For 2012, Arden International entered an agreement with Caterham to join the Formula Renault 3.5 series as a joint team known as Arden Caterham. For their first season, they signed former GP3 driver for MW Arden Lewis Williamson, and one of Caterham F1's test drivers, Alexander Rossi.

Rossi scored his first podium finish with a third place finish at the one race round at Monaco. After 3 rounds, Williamson was dropped by the team and the Red Bull Junior Driver Programme for failing to score a single point and was replaced by António Félix da Costa who had also replaced him at the Junior Programme too. On his debut, Da Costa scored two points with a ninth place finish during the first race at the Nürburgring

Drivers who graduated to F1

The following drivers who have competed for any of Arden International series teams have successfully graduated to F1:

Vitantonio Liuzzi
Competed for Arden's F3000 team in 2004. He joined Red Bull Racing in 2005, Scuderia Toro Rosso from 2006 to 2007, Force India from 2008 to 2010 and finally HRT for 2011. Since 2012, he is without an F1 drive even though he is listed as a driver on the HRT website. His best finish in Formula One is a 6th place at both the 2007 Chinese Grand Prix and the 2010 Korean Grand Prix. He currently races in the International Superstars Series.
Heikki Kovalainen
Competed for Arden's GP2 team in 2005. He joined Renault as a test driver in 2006, then raced a full season for them in 2007. He then raced for McLaren for 2008 and 2009, where he recorded his first race win in Hungary. He then joined Team Lotus for 2010 and 2011, who changed their name to Caterham F1 in 2012.
Bruno Senna
Competed for Arden's GP2 team in 2007. He joined HRT for their debut season in 2010. He was left without a drive afterwards before being signed as Lotus Renault GP's third driver in 2011, who then was promoted to race driver from the 2011 Belgian Grand Prix onwards. In 2012, he raced for Williams F1. His best finish is 6th place at the 2012 Malaysian Grand Prix.
Sébastien Buemi
Competed for Arden's GP2 team in 2008 for both the Asia and Main series. He joined Scuderia Toro Rosso for the 2009 season, and stayed with them up until 2011 before being dropped. He is currently Red Bull Racing's test driver and competes for Toyota Motorsport at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. His best finish in Formula One is 7th place at both the 2009 Australian Grand Prix and the 2009 Brazilian Grand Prix.
Sergio Pérez
Competed for Arden's GP2 team in 2009. He raced for Sauber from 2011 to 2012, where he scored his first podium at the 2012 Malaysian Grand Prix. He joined McLaren in 2013.
Charles Pic
Competed for Arden's GP2 Asia team for the 2009-10 season, and the main series for 2010. He raced for Marussia in 2012, and joined the Caterham team in 2013.

So far, only Kovalainen has won a race in F1, the 2008 Hungarian Grand Prix, and he has also appeared on the podium 3 other times. He is also the highest placing driver in the drivers championship with 7th in both 2007 and 2008 with Renault and McLaren respectively. Pérez is the only other driver to score a podium finish with a 2nd place finish at 2012 Malaysian Grand Prix.

Complete series results

GP2 Series

GP2 Series Results[6]
Year Car Drivers Races Wins Poles F/Laps Points D.C. T.C.
2005 Dallara-Mecachrome Finland Heikki Kovalainen 23 5 4 1 105 2nd 2nd
France Nicolas Lapierre 23 0 1 1 21 11th
2006 Dallara-Mecachrome Germany Michael Ammermüller 21 1 0 0 25 11th 4th
France Nicolas Lapierre 17 0 0 1 32 9th
Switzerland Neel Jani 4 0 0 0 0 25th
2007 Dallara-Mecachrome Brazil Bruno Senna 21 1 0 0 34 8th 7th†
South Africa Adrian Zaugg 19 0 0 0 10 18th
Portugal Filipe Albuquerque 2 0 0 0 0 32nd
2008 Dallara-Mecachrome Switzerland Sébastien Buemi 20 2 0 0 50 6th 6th‡
Netherlands Yelmer Buurman 10 0 0 0 5 20th
Italy Luca Filippi 10 0 0 0 1 19th
2009 Dallara-Mecachrome Mexico Sergio Pérez 20 0 0 1 22 12th 8th[1]
Italy Edoardo Mortara 20 1 0 2 19 14th
2010 Dallara-Mecachrome France Charles Pic 20 1 1 0 28 10th 7th†
Venezuela Rodolfo González 20 0 0 0 4 21st
2011 Dallara-Mecachrome Czech Republic Josef Král 18 0 0 0 15 15th 11th
United Kingdom Jolyon Palmer 18 0 0 0 0 28th
2012 Dallara-Mecachrome Switzerland Simon Trummer 24 0 0 0 4 23rd 3rd
Brazil Luiz Razia 24 4 0 3 222 2nd
2013 Dallara-Mecachrome Venezuela Johnny Cecotto, Jr. 21 0 1 1 41 16th 8th
New Zealand Mitch Evans 22 0 0 0 56 14th

† Ran under a Dutch license.
‡ Involved as Trust Team Arden under a Dutch license.
[1] Involved as Telmex Arden International under a Dutch license

GP3 Series

GP3 Series Results
Year Car Drivers Races Wins Poles F/Laps Points D.C. T.C.
2010 Dallara-Renault Denmark Michael Christensen 16 0 0 0 0 31st 9th
Spain Miki Monrás 16 0 0 1 17 10th
Brazil Leonardo Cordeiro 16 0 0 1 1 27th
2011 Dallara-Renault New Zealand Mitch Evans 16 1 2 0 29 9th 2nd
Switzerland Simon Trummer 16 0 0 0 9 18th
United Kingdom Lewis Williamson 16 1 1 0 31 8th
2012 Dallara-Renault New Zealand Mitch Evans 16 3 4 2 151.5 1st 2nd
Italy David Fumanelli 14 0 0 0 47 11th
Finland Matias Laine 16 1 0 1 111 5th
2013 Dallara-Renault Spain Carlos Sainz, Jr. 16 0 1 2 66 10th 2nd
Romania Robert Vișoiu 16 2 0 0 44 12th
Russia Daniil Kvyat 16 3 2 4 168 1st

Formula Renault 3.5 Series

Formula Renault 3.5 Series
Year Car Drivers Races Wins Poles F/Laps Podiums Points D.C. T.C.
2012 Dallara-Renault United States Alexander Rossi 17 0 0 4 1 63 11th 2nd
United Kingdom Lewis Williamson 5 0 0 0 0 0 32nd
Portugal António Félix da Costa 12 4 0 2 6 166 4th
2013 Dallara-Renault Portugal António Félix da Costa 17 3 1 2 6 172 3rd 4th
Brazil Pietro Fantin 17 0 0 0 0 14 21st

^ Collaboration with Caterham known as Arden Caterham.[7]

Complete former series results

GP2 Asia Series

  • † Involved as Trust Team Arden under a Dutch License.
  • ‡ Ran under a Dutch license.

A1 GP Series

Viktor Maslov in the Arden garage, 2001

International Formula 3000 Series

Italian Formula 3000 Series

  • † Involved as Arden Team Russia
  • ‡ Involved as Lukoil Arden Racing
  • [1] collaboration with KTR team

Timeline

1990s 2000s 2010s
97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14
Formulas International Formula 3000 GP2 Series
Italian F3000 A1GP GP2 Asia Series Formula Renault 3.5
GP3 Series

Sources

  1. "Arden signs Rene Binder for 2014". GP2 Series (GP2 Motorsport Limited). 19 December 2013. Retrieved 19 December 2013. 
  2. Khorounzhiy, Valentin (16 January 2014). "Andre Negrao completes Arden’s GP2 lineup". PaddockScout.com (Paddock Scout). Retrieved 16 January 2014. 
  3. "KRAL AND PALMER JOIN ARDEN FOR 2011 GP2 SEASON". http://gp2series.com/. 2011-01-26. Retrieved 2011-01-26. 
  4. "Visoiu continues with Arden for 2014 GP3 season". GP3 Series (GP2 Motorsport Limited). 15 January 2014. Retrieved 15 January 2014. 
  5. "Arden confirms Niederhauser for 2014 GP3 season". GP3 Series (GP2 Motorsport Limited). 15 January 2014. Retrieved 15 January 2014. 
  6. 6.0 6.1 GP2 and Formula 3000 entrylist and complete results speedsportmag.com
  7. "Arden Caterham". World Series By Renault. Retrieved 27 May 2012. 
  8. A1GP complete resultsresults.a1gp.com
  9. Italian Formula 3000 complete results speedsportmag.com

External links

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