Gabriele Tarquini (born 2 March 1962) is an Italian racing driver.
He participated in 78 Formula One Grands Prix, debuting on May 3, 1987. He scored 1 championship point, and holds the record for the most failed attempts to qualify. He has subsequently raced successfully in Touring Cars, winning the BTCC in 1994, the ETCC in 2003 the WTCC in 2009 and the WTCR in 2018.
On 22 November 2009 he won the 2009 FIA World Touring Car Championship title at the age of 47 years and 266 days. This made him the oldest ever world champion in an FIA series, breaking Juan Manuel Fangio’s record of being FIA Formula One World Drivers’ Champion at the age of 46 years and 41 days in 1957. Tarquini backed up this record by winning the 2018 FIA World Touring Car Cup at the age of 56 years and 259 days. Info from Wiki
Bio by Stephen Latham
Gabriele Tarquini participated in 78 Formula One Grands Prix then raced successfully in Touring Cars, compete in British Touring Cars, Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft, International Touring Cars, Super Tourenwagen Cup, European Touring Cars, World Touring Cars, the World Touring Car Cup, Scandinavian Touring Cars and the TCR International Series and he won the BTCC in 1994, the ETCC in 2003 and the WTCC in 2009.
After starting in karting, then attending the CSAI racing school at Vallelunga in 1983, Gabriele competed in six rounds of the Italian F3 Championship. In the following year there were further F3 races with Coloni plus a return to karting saw him win the World, European and Italian Championships.
In 1985 he moved into F3000 and took points in his first three races, including a third at Estoril plus two fourth place finishes, in Sanremo Racing’s March 85B-Cosworth. During the year he also raced a Brun Porsche 956B at Le Mans (with O.Larrauri and M.Sigala) plus had a test drive with Benetton. He drove for Enzo Coloni’s team the following year, with a third place finish at the Osterreichringbeing being his best result. Signing for First Racing for his third F3000 season, he took a third at Enna-Pergusa and second at Imola. The year also saw Gabriele make his F1 debut for Osella at the San Marino Grand Prix, retiring due to gearbox problems, and he also drove a Beretta Brixia Motor Sport Alfa 75 Turbo with Rinaldo Drovandi in the WTTC.
1988 saw him join Coloni’s Grand Prix team but the season had a prequalifying system, as there were 31 entrants for 30 places in qualifying. The slowest of the new entrants (Coloni, Rial, Dallara and EuroBrun) would be eliminated after the Friday morning session regardless of their overall position; Gabriele failed to prequalify several times despite often being faster than some of the exempt entrants, such as Osella and Zakspeed. An eighth place finish in Canada would stand as his, and the team’s best ever result.
He signed to drive for the FIRST team but after their car failed crash tests, he started the year without a ride. However, he then joined AGS (replacing Philippe Streiff after his career ending crash) and his early form was impressive. He was one of the stars in Monaco, almost qualifying in the top six before ending up thirteeth on the grid though in the race he was running fourth before retiring with an electrical problem. He finished sixth in the Mexican Grand Prix, but Williams and Scuderia Italia appealed against being disqualified at Imola and he lost his point. He stayed with the team for the next two seasons, then switched to Fondmetal, qualifying for every race entered during 1992 though the team folded after the Italian GP.
His final GP was at the Nürburgring in 1995 when he replaced an injured Ukyo Katayama at Tyrrell-Yamaha but by now he was competing in Touring Cars, having won the 1994 BTCC title in an Alfa Romeo.
In 1995 he competed in the British and Italian Touring Car Championship and in 1996 stepped up to the International Touring Car series (alongside N.Larini and A.Nannini) in an Alfa 155 V6 Tl and there was a victory at Silverstone. For the following season he moved to Super Touring, taking four victories in a Honda in his three years with the team. He also raced in the German STW Cup and Belgian Procar then switched to the European Touring Car Championship with considerable success, winning it for Alfa Romeo in 2003 with victories at Barcelona, Enna Pergusa, Spa and Estoril. When the ETCC became the World Touring Car Championship in 2005, he remained with Alfa Romeo and won at Donington Park and Istanbul.
Then came five seasons racing SEATs, finishing second in the championship in 2008 though 2009 saw him achieve the biggest success of his career when he became the WTCC champion. After SEAT withdrew, Gabriele raced for a semi-works SR-Sport team, and scored wins in Brazil, Morocco, Belgium, Portugal and Spain to finish second. The following year saw him with the Lukoil-SUNRED team, taking one win and then came a drive for JAS Honda Racing, alongside Tiago Monteiro. In 2011 he also drove Polestar Racing’s Volvo C30 in the Scandinavian Touring Car Series.
He left Honda after several seasons racing for them in the WTTC and joined Lada Sport for 2016, winning with them at Moscow Raceway and Losail. He then went on to play a key role in developing Hyundai’s i30 N TCR into a winner, having signed as their development driver, and raced the i30N for BRC Racing in 2017 and 2018 in the TCR International Series.
