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Christian Klien extracted from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License

Christian Klien Klien at the inaugural Honda F1 Charity Open Day Nationality Austrian Formula One World Championship career Active years 2004–2006 Teams Jaguar, Red Bull Races 48 (46 starts) Championships 0 Wins 0 Podiums 0 Career points 14 Pole positions 0 Fastest laps 0 First race 2004 Australian Grand Prix Last race 2006 Italian Grand Prix 2006 position 18th (2 pts) 24 Hours of Le Mans career Participating years 2008 - Teams Team Peugeot Total Best finish 3rd (2008) Class wins 0

Christian Klien (born February 7, 1983) is an Austrian former Formula One racing driver. Although he has scored 14 points in Formula 1, Klien has yet to achieve a podium finish.

Contents 1 Racing career 2 Racing career 2.1 Pre-Formula One 2.2 Formula One 2.2.1 2004: Jaguar 2.2.2 2005-2006: Red Bull Racing 2.2.3 2007 onwards: Honda F1 and BMW Sauber 3 Racing record 3.1 Career summary 3.2 Complete Formula One results 4 References 4.1 Footnotes 5 See also 6 External links

Racing career

Born in Hohenems, Klien started his motorsport career in his early teens. He raced in karting championships in both Austria and Switzerland, before moving to Formula BMW. After winning several titles in lower Formulas, Klien moved into Formula One, driving for the Jaguar Racing team, alongside Mark Webber. At the end of 2004, however, Jaguar sold its Formula One team to Red Bull, which renamed it Red Bull Racing. In an unusual arrangement, Klien shared a race seat with Italian Vitantonio Liuzzi. He stayed at Red Bull for 2006, whilst Liuzzi moved to the Red Bull junior team, Scuderia Toro Rosso.

After an unsuccessful 2006, Klien's old teammate Mark Webber replaced him for the 2007 season. Klien was offered alternatives to Formula One for 2007, including driving in the ChampCar series, but he refused and aimed for a seat in Formula One. He secured the test driver's seat at Honda, despite competition from other drivers, including Gary Paffett.

On February 2, 2008 Klien signed as BMW Sauber's reserve and test driver for the 2008 Formula One season, alongside Estonian Marko Asmer.

Racing career

Pre-Formula One

Klien became enthused about racing when his dad brought him to watch a Go-Kart race. This enthusiasm for the sport was only increased after meeting Brazilian Formula One driver Ayrton Senna.¹ The Austrian started his career at the age of 13.² From 1996 to 1998, Klien won several kart races in both Switzerland and his native Austria, becoming the Suisse champion in his first year.

In 1999, Klien moved to racing in the Formula BMW ADAC Junior Cup, winning four races and finishing fourth in the series.² The following year, he moved into the main Formula BMW ADAC Championship with Team Rosberg, finishing the series ranked tenth overall and third in the rookie rankings.² Continuing in the series in 2001, Klien managed to win five races, and ended up third in the series.² Joining JD Motorsport for the Italian winter Formula Renault series, he won one event, which lead to a drive for the team in German Formula Renault for 2002.²

Klien won four races, winning the German title, and finishing fifth in the European series. From there, Klien moved into the Formula Three Euroseries, with Mucke Motorsport, winning four races and finishing runner-up to Ryan Briscoe. Klien also won the 2003 Marlboro Masters event at Zandvoort.²

Formula One

2004: Jaguar

In December 2003, Klien was signed as a race driver for the Jaguar Formula One team for the 2004 season,³ replacing Justin Wilson, who had replaced Antônio Pizzonia for the final 5 Grand Prix of the 2003 season.⁴ He had significant pressure on him as second driver to his more experienced teammate Mark Webber, but was the first driver to ever outqualify Webber from the same team.

Klien proved to be considerably reliable over the season, retiring only on 4 occasions out of the possible 18. Klien's only points scoring finish in his debut season came in Belgium, where Klien finished sixth; scoring 3 Championship points. He finished alongside Cristiano da Matta and Nick Heidfeld in joint 16th in the Drivers' Championship.

2005-2006: Red Bull Racing

2005

Jaguar were bought out in November 2004 by Austrian energy drink company Red Bull and were renamed "Red Bull Racing".⁵ During winter testing in 2005, Klien tested several times for Red Bull Racing alongside Vitantonio Liuzzi and David Coulthard. Klien secured the second race seat at Red Bull, alongside the veteran Coulthard. Klien started the year with points finishes in the first two races before retiring in Bahrain before the race had even started due to an electrical problem.

With both Klien and Liuzzi signed to race for the Red Bull team in 2005, Red Bull announced that Liuzzi would be racing at the next 4 rounds in San Marino, Spain, Monaco and the European Grands Prix instead of Klien.⁶ Originally, Klien was ineligible to be a third driver at these Grand Prix, as he had competed in over six Grand Prix the previous year, but after a majority of teams asked the FIA to remove this ruling, Klien was allowed to take this role at Imola.⁷

The Austrian returned to the race seat for the Canadian Grand Prix and maintained his race seat thanks to his strong performances and Red Bull's increased number of seats from the purchase of the Minardi team in 2006.⁸ Klien finished his second year in Formula One with two further points finishes: an 8th place finish in Turkey and a 5th at the season-finale in China. After a promising performance in China, it was confirmed in December 2005 that Klien would drive for the Red Bull Racing outfit alongside David Coulthard for the 2006 season.

2006

Klien started 2006 strongly, qualifying in the top 10 for the first 2 races of the season. In Bahrain he finished 8th, scoring a point. However, in Malaysia he collided with Kimi Räikkönen on the first lap and had to pit with suspension damage, before eventually dropping out with a hydraulic failure.

In 2006, Klien was unsuccessful in comparison to his more experienced teammate David Coulthard, as the Brit scored the team's first podium and was more consistent than Klien throughout the season. In August 2006, it was confirmed that Klien would not stay with the Red Bull team for the upcoming 2007 season, or at least as a race driver, due to Red Bull's signing of Mark Webber.⁹ After the 2 points finishes in Bahrain and Germany, there was some uncertainty as to where Klien would go next in his racing career, speculation suggested America as a logical choice for the Austrian, but he refused a ChampCar seat in a Red Bull-backed team for 2007, preferring to chase a Formula One drive with another team.¹⁰ As a result, the team announced that Klien had been dropped for the last three races of the season in favour of test driver Robert Doornbos.¹¹

2007 onwards: Honda F1 and BMW Sauber

On November 15, 2006, Honda Racing announced the signing of Christian Klien as their test and reserve driver for the 2007 season.¹² The Austrian made his debut for the Japanese works team at the Circuit de Catalunya, during the early pre-season testing during late November, 2006. At the 2007 British Grand Prix, he replaced the injured Jenson Button for the second free practice session on Friday.¹³ On 11 July 2007, Klien was released by Honda F1 to test with Spyker with a view to replacing Christijan Albers who was released because of sponsorship problems.¹⁴ However, the seat went to Japanese driver Sakon Yamamoto.

In 2008 Christian signed as BMW Sauber's test and reserve driver for the 2008 Formula One season. He also signed with Peugeot to race in 24 Hours of Le Mans. Driving the Peugeot 908 he finished third overall with Ricardo Zonta and Franck Montagny. In October he participated in Petit Le Mans in the American Le Mans Series, driving with Peugeot's factory drivers Marc Gené and Nicolas Minassian.

Klien remained in the position of BMW Sauber's test and reserve driver for 2009.¹⁵

For 2010, Klien was understood to be a target for Sauber before the seat went to Pedro de la Rosa, however he is still hopeful of an F1 seat elsewhere.¹⁶

Racing record

Career summary

Season	Series	Team Name	Races	Poles	Wins	Points	Final Placing
1999	Formula BMW Junior	ADAC Sport München	20	1	3	193	4th
2000	Formula BMW ADAC	Team Rosberg	19	0	0	57	10th
2001	Formula BMW ADAC	Team Rosberg	19	3	5	232	3rd
2002	Formula Renault 2000 Eurocup	JD Motorsport	8	0	0	92	6th
	Formula Renault 2000 Germany	JD Motorsport	14	2	4	278	1st
2003	Formula Three Euroseries	Mücke Motorsport	20	6	3	89	2nd
	Masters of Formula Three	Mücke Motorsport	1	0	1	N/A	1st
2004	Formula One	Jaguar	18	0	0	3	16th
2005	Formula One	Red Bull	15	0	0	9	15th
2006	Formula One	Red Bull	15	0	0	2	18th
2007	Formula One	Honda	Test driver
2008	Formula One	BMW Sauber	Test driver
2009	Formula One	BMW Sauber	Test driver

Complete Formula One results

(key)

Yr	Entrant	Chassis	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	WDC	Points
2004	Jaguar Racing	Jaguar R5	Cosworth CR-6 3.0 V10	AUS 11	MAL 10	BHR 14	SMR 14	ESP Ret	MON Ret	EUR 12	CAN 9	USA Ret	FRA 11	GBR 14	GER 10	HUN 13	BEL 6	ITA 13		JPN 12	BRA 14		16th	3
		Jaguar R5B																	CHN Ret
2005	Red Bull Racing	Red Bull RB1	Cosworth TJ2005 3.0 V10	AUS 7	MAL 8	BHR DNS	SMR TD	ESP TD	MON TD	EUR TD	CAN 8	USA DNS	FRA Ret	GBR 15	GER 9	HUN Ret	TUR 8	ITA 13	BEL 9	BRA 9	JPN 9	CHN 5	15th	9
2006	Red Bull Racing	Red Bull RB2	Ferrari 056 2.4 V8	BHR 8	MAL Ret	AUS Ret	SMR Ret	EUR Ret	ESP 13	MON Ret	GBR 14	CAN 11	USA Ret	FRA 12	GER 8	HUN Ret	TUR 11	ITA 11	CHN	JPN	BRA		18th	2
2007	Honda Racing F1 Team	Honda RA107	Honda RA807E 2.4 V8	AUS	MAL	BHR	ESP	MON	CAN	USA	FRA	GBR TD	EUR	HUN	TUR	ITA	BEL	JPN	CHN	BRA			-	-

References

Footnotes

See also

• List of Austrians in sports
• Famous Austrians

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Christian Klien

• Christian Klien Official website
• Christian Klien Unofficial Forum
• Christian Klien profile and statistics
• Christian Klien statistics
• Christian Klien statistics at Driver Database. (includes pre-F1 career)

Sporting positions
Preceded by Fabio Carbone	Formula Three Masters Winner 2003	Succeeded by Alexandre Prémat

v â€¢ d â€¢ e BMW Sauber Personnel: Mario Theissen Â· Peter Sauber Â· Willy Rampf Drivers: Nick Heidfeld Â· Robert Kubica Â· Sebastian Vettel Â· Jacques Villeneuve Formula One cars: F1.06 Â· F1.07 Â· F1.08 Â· F1.09 See also: Sauber (1993–2005, 2010–)