Christijan Albers


Christijan Albers is a Dutch professional racing driver. After success in the DTM he drove in Formula One from until the 2007 British Grand Prix, shortly after which he was dropped by the Spyker F1 team. 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.

Personal

Christijan is the son of former rallycross ace and Porsche 911 Carrera campaigner André Albers, who won the 1979 Dutch International Rallycross Championship. 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. 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)

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. At the 2005 United States Grand Prix he gained his first championship points with a fifth-place finish, a race where only six drivers started.

Midland/Spyker F1 (2006–2007)

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. Incredibly he was unharmed. Ide was reprimanded by the race stewards. Ide also had his Super Licence revoked for severe dangerous driving.
at the 2007 British Grand Prix.
After initial confusion over Albers's 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's personal sponsors had major influences in Spyker buying the Midland F1 team.
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, but he received a €5,000 penalty for dangerous driving. Spyker technical director Mike Gascoyne commented that he was mystified by the mistake, and Niki Lauda described the incident as the stupidest thing he had ever seen in F1.
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". His replacement for the 2007 European Grand Prix was former Spyker test driver Markus Winkelhock. 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.

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.

Return to DTM

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. 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.
Albers is the Netherlands's 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

YearEntrant12345678910DCPoints
2000European Arrows F3000IMO
Ret
SIL
Ret
CAT
12
NÜR
Ret
MON
Ret
MAG
7
A1R
Ret
HOC
DNQ
HUN
Ret
SPA
8
25th0

Complete DTM results

YearTeamCar1234567891011121314151617181920Pts
2001Persson MotorsportAMG-Mercedes CLK-DTMHOC
QR
13
HOC
CR
13
NÜR
QR
13
NÜR
CR
12
OSC
QR
11
OSC
CR
11
SAC
QR
16
SAC
CR
2
NOR
QR
13
NOR
CR
16
LAU
QR
12
LAU
CR
16
NÜR
QR
8
NÜR
CR
9
A1R
QR
11
A1R
CR
Ret
ZAN
QR
8
ZAN
CR
Ret
HOC
QR
14
HOC
CR
9
14th19
2002Team RosbergAMG-Mercedes CLK-DTMHOC
QR
Ret
HOC
CR
Ret
ZOL
QR
13
ZOL
CR
6
DON
QR
11
DON
CR
4
SAC
QR
13
SAC
CR
8
NOR
QR
10
NOR
CR
6
LAU
QR
20
LAU
CR
14
NÜR
QR
18
NÜR
CR
17
A1R
QR
19
A1R
CR
13
ZAN
QR
Ret
ZAN
CR
12
HOC
QR
11
HOC
CR
9
12th5
2003HWA TeamAMG-Mercedes CLK 2003HOC
5
ADR
1
NÜR
1
LAU
7
NOR
1
DON
5
NÜR
2
A1R
3
ZAN
1
HOC
12
2nd64
2004HWA TeamAMG-Mercedes C-Klasse 2004HOC
2
EST
1
ADR
2
LAU
2
NOR
2
SHA1
6
NÜR
16†
OSC
12
ZAN
3
BRN
Ret
HOC
7
3rd50
2008Futurecom TMEAudi A4 DTM 2006HOC
Ret
OSC
16
MUG
13
LAU
14
NOR
Ret
ZAN
Ret
NÜR
11
BRH
14
CAT
10
BUG
13
HOC
Ret
17th0

YearEntrantChassisEngine12345678910111213141516171819Pts
Minardi F1 TeamMinardi PS04BCosworth CR-3L 3.0 V10AUS
Ret
MAL
13
BHR
13
19th4
Minardi F1 TeamMinardi PS05Cosworth TJ2005 3.0 V10SMR
Ret
ESP
Ret
MON
14
EUR
17
CAN
11
USA
5
FRA
Ret
GBR
18
GER
13
HUN
NC
TUR
Ret
ITA
19
BEL
12
BRA
14
JPN
16
CHN
16
19th4
MF1 RacingMidland M16Toyota RVX-06 2.4 V8BHR
Ret
MAL
12
AUS
11
SMR
Ret
EUR
13
ESP
Ret
MON
12
GBR
15
CAN
Ret
USA
Ret
FRA
15
GER
DSQ
HUN
10
TUR
Ret
22nd0
Spyker MF1 TeamMidland M16Toyota RVX-06 2.4 V8ITA
17
CHN
15
JPN
Ret
BRA
14
22nd0
Etihad Aldar Spyker F1 TeamSpyker F8-VIIFerrari 056H 2.4 V8AUS
Ret
MAL
Ret
BHR
14
ESP
14
MON
19
CAN
Ret
USA
15
FRA
Ret
GBR
15
EURHUNTURITABELJPNCHNBRA25th0

Did not finish the race, but was classified as he had completed more than 90% of the race distance.

Complete American Le Mans Series results

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Complete Le Mans Series results

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results