Ralph Firman

Former F1 driver
Name = Ralph Firman

| Nationality = flagicon|Ireland Irish
Years = F1|2003
Team(s) = Jordan
Races = 15 (14 starts)
Championships = 0
Wins = 0
Podiums = 0
Points = 1
Poles = 0
Fastest laps = 0
Points = 1
First race = 2003 Australian Grand Prix
First win =
Last win =
Last race = 2003 Japanese Grand Prix

Ralph David Firman Jr. (born May 20 1975 in Norwich, Norfolk) is a racing driver from the United Kingdom, who now races under Irish citizenship (his mother Angela is Irish) and an Irish-issued racing licence. Earlier in his career he raced under a British licence. His father, Ralph Firman Sr., co-founded the Van Diemen racecar constructor with Ross Ambrose, father of NASCAR racer Marcos.

Educated at Gresham's School between 1988 and 1993, Firman went straight into motor racing on leaving school and won the 1996 British Formula Three Championship, at his second attempt.

1996 Macau Grand Prix controversy

Firman won the prestigious Macau Grand Prix in 1996 under controversial circumstances. At the end of round 1, Firman finished ahead of German Formula 3 champion Jarno Trulli. In round 2, he was overtaken by Trulli on the last lap. Firman was running with a broken front wing. Just as Jarno Trulli was on the way to victory, Firman crashed at the hairpin corner, blocked the track and caused a red flag. The race officials counted the results to the previous lap when Firman was ahead of Trulli, thus giving him the win.

1997 onwards

Firman then moved to Japan, culminating in the 2002 Formula Nippon championship, before returning to Europe. He participated in 14 Formula One grands prix, debuting on March 9, 2003. He scored 1 championship point, in the 2003 Spanish Grand Prix. He was injured in a huge crash during practice for the 2003 Hungarian Grand Prix which forced him to sit out this and the next race, in which he was replaced by Zsolt Baumgartner.

Firman has also competed in the Le Mans 24 Hours, and was an official test driver for the A1 Grand Prix series in August 2004.

Ralph's sister Natasha is also a racing driver.

In August 2005, it was announced that he would be the driver for A1 Team Ireland. He had previously been seen to be in competition for the Great Britain seat.

In 2007, Firman, along with Daisuke Ito, won the Japan Super GT GT500 class championship with the Aguri Suzuki co-owned ARTA team. Firman and Ito won the championship before the final race of the season, a first in the series ultra-competitive history.

Complete Formula One results

()

External links

* [http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/drv-firral.html GP Encyclopedia]