Marcus Ericsson

Marcus Ericsson (born 2 September 1990) is a Swedish race car driver. After a successful début in car racing in 2007 which saw him take the British Formula BMW title with Fortec Motorsport, he moved up into the British team's British Formula Three squad. After finishing as one of the top rookies in the category, Ericsson turned his attentions to the All-Japan Formula Three Championship where he won the championship in his debut year. In 2010, he moved up to the GP2 Series where he secured one victory during his maiden campaign for Super Nova Racing. Between 2011 and 2012, Ericsson drove for iSport. Ericsson completed the 2013 GP2 season with DAMS, and debuted in Formula One in with Caterham F1.

Karting
Born in Kumla, Örebro County, Ericsson's first taste of motorsport came when he was nine years old racing in karts. "I got a call from Fredrik Ekblom, whom I ran in British Formula 3000 and Indy Lights. He now runs a kart circuit and he told me about a nine-year old kid who'd walked in off the street and nearly broke the lap record" recalled Richard Dutton, head of Fortec Motorsport. Ekblom managed to convince Ericsson's father, Tomas, to buy his son a kart and the young Swede stayed in karting for the next four years, "I'd never really thought about racing as a career. My family didn't have the money for me to race formula cars so we never thought about it" Ericsson recalled.

It was in 2006 that Ericsson's career got notable backing in the form of former Champ Car driver and 1999 Indianapolis 500 winner Kenny Bräck. "I spotted Marcus at a race in Gothenburg" Bräck says, "He didn't win the race because his engine blew up with two laps to go but he was clearly the best out there. He didn't get caught in any battles when passing – he'd just wait for the right opportunity, then he pounced and he was away. He has such patience but when he does go for it, it measures so perfectly. He reminded me of watching Alain Prost" Bräck added.



Formula BMW
Bräck had managed to convince Richard Dutton, who ran the Swede in British F3 in 1989, to race Ericsson for his Fortec Motorsport team's 2007 Formula BMW UK title challenge. Ericsson was realistic of his chances during the season, "I was thinking that I should be around top eight to start with, trying for podiums and maybe wins by the end of the year". However, Ericsson's first win came earlier than expected at the first meeting of the series at Brands Hatch where he took third place in the first race and won from pole position in the second race. Following his win, Ericsson was hailed as "the best young talent" Bräck had ever seen. The Swede was in the title race for the whole season, challenging Czech Josef Král and Brit Henry Arundel. In the end, the sixteen–year–old won the title by 40 points from Kral, becoming the final Champion of the British Formula BMW series prior to the series merge with the German series to make a European FBMW championship.

Formula Three
Following his win of the Formula BMW title, Ericsson began aiming for a seat in Formula Three. Tests soon followed with British Formula Three team Räikkönen Robertson Racing as part of his prize for winning the title that year. Soon afterwards the Swede had a test with frontrunning Formula Three Euroseries team ASM Formule 3, now ART Grand Prix. Despite an offer to join the French team, Ericsson opted to stay in England and join Fortec's British Formula Three team. The Swede showed his pace to the F3 paddock with two pole positions and a handful of podium finishes, but no victories, which gave him fifth overall in the championship.

During the winter of 2008, Ericsson signed a contract with the Japanese F3 team TOM'S to compete full-time in the championship for the upcoming season. The Swede reasoned that he could was more likely to gain the experience needed to win the Macau Grand Prix in comparison to competing further in the British championship. Ericsson won the Japanese F3 championship, and also won races when making guest appearances back in British F3. He consequently participated in the Macau Grand Prix where he qualified in pole position and finished the main race in fourth position.

GP2 Series
Ericsson moved into the GP2 Asia Series for the 2009–10 GP2 Asia Series season, driving originally for the ART Grand Prix team. However, it was later confirmed that Ericsson will drive for Super Nova Racing in the 2010 GP2 Series season. He had been expected to complete the rest of the Asian series with the team, but Jake Rosenzweig was signed to replace Ericsson for the final two rounds. Ericsson returned to Super Nova for the 2010 season, partnering Josef Král and later Luca Filippi. He took his first series victory at Valencia, but only scoring points on two further occasions restricted him to seventeenth place in the drivers' championship.



Ericsson switched to the iSport International team for 2011, alongside Sam Bird. He finished sixth in the Asia series championship, and tenth in the main series championship. He remained with iSport for 2012, alongside Jolyon Palmer. After a relatively disappointing start to the year, his fortunes improved with a victory at Spa, kickstarting a run of six consecutive points finishes to the end of the season, including two podium finishes. This late flourish lifted him to eighth in the championship.

In 2013, he got the chance to drive for the reiging champions DAMS. Despite showing great pace in qualifying, taking pole position in Spain and Great Britain, he was very unlucky in the races. A turning point came in Germany, where he won the sprint race, and he continued with podium positions in Hungary, Belgium, Singapore and Abu Dhabi to finish 6th in the championship.

Formula One
Ericsson drove for Brawn GP at the young driver test at Circuito de Jerez over three days, on 1–3 December 2009. He tested alongside IndyCar Series driver Mike Conway. Conway had the edge by three tenths of a second, however team principal Ross Brawn commended Ericsson for his performance, saying that he had "performed very well showing exceptional maturity in his approach and feedback".

Caterham (2014)
It was announced on 21 November 2013 that Ericsson was a candidate to drive for the Caterham F1 Team in 2014 with Kamui Kobayashi as teammates. On 21 January 2014, the team announced that Ericsson and Kobayashi would be their race driver line up for the forthcoming season, with Robin Frijns as reserve.

Ericsson qualified 20th in his debut race - the 2014 Australian Grand Prix and made a very good beginning to the race, running 11th before he fell back with oil pressure problems. In Malaysia, he qualified last, but improved in the race, finishing 14th in front of main rival Max Chilton. In Spain, he outqualified Kobayashi for the first time of his career, but he was behind the both Marussia cars. He finished the race in 20th position - last. In the next race, the 2014 Monaco Grand Prix, he was involved in a collision with Williams driver Felipe Massa during qualifying, causing Massa to stay out of Q2. Ericsson was penalised with two penalty points and had to start from the pitlane. But he drove a good race and took advantage of others' bad luck to finish in 11th place, just missing out his and Caterham's first points. After this, Ericsson had some tough races in the slow Caterham, and it took until the Belgian Grand Prix where he could match the Marussias again, losing 16th place to Chilton on the very last lap. In Singapore, he did a good job saving his tyres and was able to keep both Marussias behind him to finish in 15th place and in Japan, he out-qualified both Marussias and Kobayashi for 19th position. He started 17th, but spun behind the saftey car in heavy rain, and had to fight back from last place. He finished 17th after some really fast laps, in front of both Marussias and Kobayashi, but his great performance was overshadowed by the crash of Bianchi.

At the inaugural Russian Grand Prix, he qualified in a career-best 17th position and this time, he was only 0.15 seconds from making it into Q2. During the race, he started 16th but fell back as expected, finishing 19th overall but in front of his main rivals - the other Caterham and the sole Marussia of Chilton (who eventually retired from the race).

Due to Caterham F1 falling into administration on 21 October 2014, neither team driver was able to compete at the United States Grand Prix. Despite this, Ericsson flew to Texas to commentate the race for Swedish television and, as it transpired, to secure a new drive for 2015. Ericsson terminated his contract with Caterham on 12 November.

Sauber (2015)
At the 2014 United States Grand Prix, Sauber announced that it had signed Ericsson for, due in part to his substantial financial backing.

Complete GP2 Series results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete GP2 Asia Series results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete Formula One results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)