James Courtney

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
James Courtney celebrates a race win

James Courtney (born June 29, 1980 in Sydney ) is an Australian racing driver . In 2010 he won the championship title of the V8 Supercars .

Career

Courtney began his motorsport career in 1987 in karting and was active in this sport until 1998. In 1999 he switched to the single-seater racing and was fifth in the British Formula Ford . In 2000 he stayed in this championship and won the championship with six wins from 14 races ahead of Mark Taylor . In 2001 he switched to the British Formula 3 Championship , where he competed as a teammate of André Lotterer for the Jaguar Junior Team . The Australian won the season opener and was on the podium nine times later in the season. He finished the season as the best driver of his team in fourth place in the championship.

In 2002, Courtney moved to Carlin Motorsport within the British Formula 3 Championship . He was also a test driver for the Jaguar Formula 1 team. Courtney initially won four races in the British Formula 3 Championship and led the championship. He had a serious accident during Formula 1 test drives in Monza during the season . At a speed of 330 km / h, the rear suspension of the Jaguar broke. Courtney hit the wall at 306 km / h and was thrown back onto the track. A deceleration of 67 g was measured on impact. The racing driver's brain was crushed in the accident and he suffered from failure on the right side of his body after the accident. Courtney suffered from the consequences of the accident for another year and had a severe migraine during that period. In addition, he only took part in one other Formula 1 test. In the British Formula 3 Championship, Courtney skipped a race weekend and then returned. Although he managed another victory, it was no longer enough to win the championship title. The racing driver was ultimately runner-up behind Robbie Kerr .

2003 Courtney left Europe and switched to the Japanese Formula 3 championship . He won 13 out of 20 races and secured the championship title from Ronnie Quintarelli . He also made his debut in Formula Nippon this season . He started in four races and finished 13th overall at the end of the season. In 2004 he turned his back on formula racing and switched to GT racing. He stayed in the Japanese GT Championship Super GT for two years and finished both seasons in seventh place overall. In total, he was on the podium four times.

After Courtney had already participated in two races of the V8 Supercar , an Australian touring car championship, in a Holden Commodore in 2005 and had finished the 2005 season in 47th place overall, he entered this series in full in 2006. He changed brands and started for Stone Brothers Racing in a Ford Falcon . The Australian finished four races on the podium and finished eleventh overall at the end of the season. In 2007 he improved to ninth place overall with seven podium finishes. In 2006 he achieved his first victory in the V8 supercar in the Ford Falcon. In the championship he improved to sixth place overall.

In 2009 he moved to Dick Johnson Racing , who also used a Ford Falcon. Courtney won two races and finished the season in seventh place. In 2010 he dueled with Jamie Whincup for the championship title of the V8 Supercars. Whincup won with nine wins more races than Courtney, who won five races, but the championship went to Courtney, who won the title fight with 3055 to 2990 points.

In the following years he was unable to continue the successes achieved. The best overall ranking was sixth in 2014. He finished the 2019 championship in eleventh.

Personal

Courtney is married and has two children (one daughter, one son).

statistics

Career stations

Web links

Commons : James Courtney  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b "Courtney: Monza crash 2002 ended the Formula 1 dreams" (Motorsport-Total.com on December 5, 2010)
  2. ^ "Courtney: 'I was very lucky'" (Motorsport-Total.com on July 18, 2002)
personal data
SURNAME Courtney, James
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Australian racing driver
DATE OF BIRTH June 29, 1980
PLACE OF BIRTH Sydney , Australia