Gastón Hugo Mazzacane (born 8 May 1975) is an Argentine racing driver.
He participated in 21 Formula One Grands Prix, debuting on 12 March 2000. He scored no championship points. His father named him after Gastón Perkins, a successful Argentine touring car racer. His last name literally translates from Italian as “kill the dog”.
He began his Formula One career in 1999 as the test driver for Minardi. In late February 2000, it was announced that he would be the teammate of Marc Gené in the race team. “I intend to learn over the first half of the season and then I feel I will have the confidence to perform well,” Mazzacane told the press at Minardi’s car debut at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. His debut year in Formula One began with a broken gearbox at his first race, the 2000 Australian Grand Prix, followed by a 10th place in Brazil. He went on to outqualify Gené at Imola, a feat he later accomplished twice more. The German Grand Prix was a relative high point for him; after outqualifying his teammate, he finished 11th. His highlight in the spotlights this season was on a damp Indianapolis track when he famously overtook Mika Häkkinen, who was struggling after an early gamble on dry tyres. After running up to third without stopping, he ran over his pitcrew and dropped out of the race later. Nevertheless, he finished 11 of the 17 races that year and ranked third among drivers with the most kilometres raced.
At the start of 2001, Mazzacane tested for Arrows, but finally settled into the Prost team, taking over the seat of the Sauber-bound Nick Heidfeld. He beat CART’s Oriol Servia for the Prost spot, and was announced as the second driver in January 2001. However, the 2001 San Marino Grand Prix was his final Formula One race. Alain Prost fired him by using a performance clause in his contract, and the vacancy was filled by Luciano Burti, who had recently been sacked from Jaguar Racing. Info from Wiki
Bio by Stephen Latham
Born on the 8th May 1975 in La Plata, Buenos Aires, Gaston Hugo Mazzacane was named by his father, Hugo Mazzacane, after Argentine touring car racer Gaston Perkins. He was a test driver for Minardi and went on to participate in 21 Grands Prix, spending a full season with them in 2000 and part of the 2001 season with Prost plus also contested one season in Champ Cars.
After starting his career in karting, winning some races and regional championships, he moved on to touring cars and in 1993 competed in South American F3, taking three pole positions and five wins in his first year. He decided to compete in Europe and did two seasons in Italian F3, racing for RC Motorsport then BVM Racing before progressing to three seasons of International F3000 in 1996.
In his first of two years with Auto Sport Racing, he retired the Zytek powered Lola T96/50 at the first round at Nurburgring and did not qualify at Pau while finishes in the rest of the season included tenth and eleventh at Estoril and Silverstone, fourteenth at Enna-Pergusa and nineteenth at Spa. His second season saw seventh at Spa, tenth at Silverstone, Nurburgring, Mugello and Hockenheim, fifteenth at Enna-Pergusa plus seventeenth at the A1-Ring. He then joined Astromega in 1998 and scored points in two races with their T96/50, finishing sixth at Oberschleben and Silverstone, seventh at Imola and ninth at Pau plus twelfth and thirteenth at Monaco and Enna-Pergusa.
Then in 1999 he became Minardi’s test driver and alongside his F1 commitments he was teamed with Giovanni Lavaggi in a GLV Racing Ferrari 333 SP in the Sports Racing World Cup series and they were second at Donington, fourth in Barcelona, sixth at Enna-Pergusa and a highlight came with victory at Magny-Cours in September. There was also an F3000 outing with GP Racing’s Lola B99/50 but he did not qualify at Silverstone’s Autosport International Trophy race.
In the following year he was promoted to a race seat with Minardi, alongside Marc Gene who began his second season with the team. Testing work began in January at Fiorano and when they joined tests at Barcelona the following month the cars showed good pace. The team ran an M02 chassis and although Gene finished eighth in the opening race in Australia, Gaston retired on lap forty with gearbox failure. He finished the following five races, with tenth in Brazil, thirteenth at San Marino, fifteenth at Silverstone and Barcelona plus a season best eighth in the European GP at Nurburgring. There were retirements due to accidents in Monaco and France and engine problems in Hungary while finishes included tenth and eleventh in Italy and Hockenheim, twelfth in Canada and Austria, thirteenth in Malaysia, fifteenth in Japan and seventeenth in Belgium. A highlight came at Indianapolis, when he was running third early in the race until pitting on lap 14. But in a later stop he missed his stopping position and struck one of his team’s mechanics and his race eventually ended due to engine problems on lap fifty nine. The team finished tenth in the Constructors’ Championship and qualified for some of the television revenues for the following season.
Late in the season it seemed as though sponsor PSN (Pan American Sportsnetwork, a Miami based 24 hour sports TV station) were purchasing a stakeholding in the team but the deal was declared off and PSN and Gaston would eventually be with Prost for 2001. The AP04 used a customer spec Ferrari engine, badged as an Acer in deference to the team’s title sponsor. The cars were much more reliable than the previous year’s though the team ran in the midfield once the season began and it would be a season of struggle as Alain Prost tried to keep the team going. Gaston only did four races, retiring in Australia (brakes) and Brazil (clutch) and due to an accident at San Marino and was twelfth in Malaysia. He was dropped in favour of Luciano Burti, but after an accident in Belgium, which put him out for the rest of the season, he himself was replaced by Tomas Enge. Financial problems continued to hang over the team and after the season finale in Japan, rumours began circulating about Prost’s financial status and the possibility they would go bankrupt. Then, before the 2002 season started they folded. However, Charles Nickerson’s Phoenix Finance had purchased the cars and other assets and attempted to enter a team for 2002 but the FIA viewed them as a new entry (which was subject to a $48 million entry fee). Phoenix arrived at Sepang, with engineers, two cars and Gaston and Tarso Marques as drivers but they were barred from entering. It was unclear whether the ban applied to the Malaysian race only but FIA spokesman Francesco Longanesi stated “Phoenix will not be allowed to compete in the Championship at any time this season and will therefore not be on the grid in Malaysia.”
In 2003 there was one Spanish GT outing at Jarama with Miguel Iacovacci in a Meycom Sport Venturi 400 Trophy, though they did not finish. He returned to single seaters the following year, joining Dale Coyne Racing in Champ Cars and retired due to an accident in the first race at Milwaukee, then was thirteenth at Portland and twelfth at Cleveland. He took his season best result with sixth in Toronto but did not start in Vancouver and retired due to an accident at Elkhart Lake and his final finishes saw twelfth at Montreal, thirteenth at Laguna Seca and fifteenth in Denver and Las Vegas.
He began competing in the Argentinean Top Race V6 series in 2006 and the following year saw him with a Sportteam Volkswagen Bora in Turismo Competicion 2000. During 2007 he also entered the Daytona 24 Hours with VICI Racing’s Fabcar FDSC/03 alongside Uwe Alzen, Robert Renaauer and Terry Borcheller. There were further International drives with four FIA GT Championship races in 2008 with Escuderia ACA Argentina’s Ferrari 550 Maranello. Sharing a car for three rounds with Esteban Tuero they were twentieth at the Tourist Trophy at Silverstone and thirteenth and fourteenth at the Nogaro and Monza 2 Hours but he retired alongside Martin Basso at the San Luis 2 Hours.
