CHRISTIJAN ALBERS

'Christijan Albers' () (born April 16, 1979 in Eindhoven) is a Dutch racing driver. After success in the DTM he drove in Formula One from 2005 until the 2007 British Grand Prix, shortly after which he was dropped by his Spyker F1 team.^[1]

Contents

Personal

Early career

DTM

Formula One

Minardi

Midland/Spyker F1

Complete Formula One results

Complete DTM results

References

External links

Personal

Christijan is the son of former Rallycross ace and Porsche 911 Carrera campaigner André Albers, whose best overall result ever was to win the 1979 Dutch International Rallycross Championship (GT Division). They are not related to their compatriot Marcel Albers, who was killed in a British F3 accident at Thruxton in 1992.
Christijan is married to Liselore Kooijman. Their wedding took place on November 11 2006, in Amsterdam.^[2] He resides in Monaco since January 1st 2007

Early career

Albers began kart racing at a young age, winning the Dutch National championship in 1997. That same year, he was crowned Formula Ford 1800 champion in both Netherlands and Belgium. He also participated in the Renault Megane Marlboro Masters series. In 1998, he moved up to the German Formula 3 series, winning the championship in 1999 behind 6 wins and ten poles.
In 2000, Albers raced in the Formula 3000 international championship as team-mate to Mark Webber. He failed to score a point, but team boss Paul Stoddart later signed him again. He also raced in European Formula Racing.

DTM

Beginning in 2001, Albers raced in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters for Mercedes-Benz, and graduated from a privately run team to the works AMG outfit in 2003 after the departure from the series of Uwe Alzen. He was instantly a front-runner, finishing runner-up in 2003 with a season-high 4 wins, and challenging DTM veteran and multiple champion Bernd Schneider for the title all the way up to the final race. In 2004 he again challenged for the championship lead for the most of the season but eventually finished third.
'Results'

''Season 2001''

- Team: Mercedes-Benz

- Points: 19, Position 14

''Season 2002''

- Team: Mercedes-Benz

- Points: 5, Position 12

''Season 2003''

- Team: AMG-Mercedes

- Points: 64, Position 2

- Wins: Adria, Nürburgring, Norisring, Zandvoort

''Season 2004''

- Team: AMG-Mercedes

- Points: 50, Position 3

- Wins: Estoril

Formula One

Minardi

While racing in the DTM, Albers continued to be a test and reserve driver for Minardi's Formula One interests, and has also piloted the team's two-seater F1 cars. In November 2004, he set the fastest time at a Misano di Gera d'Adda Minardi test session. He was chosen by the team to drive in the Formula One World Championship in 2005. In the 2005 United States Grand Prix he gained his first championship points with a fifth place finish, in a race where only six drivers started.

Midland/Spyker F1

On October 31 2005, Albers was confirmed as Midland's first official Formula One driver. Midland, the re-badged Jordan team, made their debut in the 2006 Formula One season.
Albers started the 2006 season well, out-pacing Midland teammate Tiago Monteiro. However, during the first few races, Midland have found themselves battling with the Super Aguri team, particularly Takuma Sato. At the 2006 San Marino Grand Prix, Albers found himself being crashed into by Yuji Ide and sent into a series of spectacular rolls. Fortunately, he was unharmed. Ide was reprimanded by the race stewards for his part in the incident.
After initial confusion over Albers' plans for 2007 after the takeover of MF1 by Spyker Cars, it was eventually confirmed that he would be driving for the Spyker F1 team in 2007.
It was later found out that Albers signed a contract with Midland F1 to remain with the team prior to the sell to Spyker. Albers' personal sponsors had major influences in Spyker buying the Midland F1 team.^[3]
In early 2007 he was outperformed by rookie team-mate Adrian Sutil. At Magny-Cours he ignored the lollipop telling him not to leave the pits during a pitstop, driving off with part of the fuel rig still attached. Albers expressed relief that nobody was hurt,^[4] but he received a €5,000 penalty for dangerous driving. Spyker technical director Mike Gascoyne commented that he was mystified by the mistake,^[5] and Niki Lauda described the incident as the most stupid thing he had ever seen in F1.^[6]
On July 10 2007, he was released from his Spyker contract, due to a lack of sponsorship money, which would have compromised the team's development programme. Team owner Michiel Mol described it as "one of the toughest decisions of my career".^[7] His replacement for the 2007 European Grand Prix was former Spyker test driver Markus Winkelhock.^[8] Sakon Yamamoto is set to race for Spyker for the rest of the year after the European GP.
Albers will return with the Spyker team for the Rotterdam street racing event in Holland, on the 18th / 19th August. After this Albers will officially leave the Spyker team.^[9]

Complete Formula One results

() (Races in 'bold' indicate pole position) (Races in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

Year	Entrant	Chassis	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	WDC	Points
2005	Minardi F1 Team	Minardi PS04B	Cosworth TJ2005 3.0 V10	AUS Ret	MAL 13	BHR 13																	19th	4
		Minardi PS05					SMR Ret	ESP Ret	MON 14	EUR 17	CAN 11	USA 5	FRA Ret	GBR 18	GER 13	HUN Ret	TUR 19	ITA 11	BEL 14	BRA 14	JPN 16	CHN 16
2006	Midland F1 Racing	Midland M16	Toyota RVX-06 2.4 V8	BHR Ret	MAL 12	AUS 11	SMR Ret	EUR 13	ESP Ret	MON 12	GBR 15	CAN Ret	USA Ret	FRA 15	GER DSQ	HUN 10	TUR Ret						22nd	0
	Spyker MF1 Team																	ITA 17	CHN 15	JPN Ret	BRA 14
2007	Etihad Aldar Spyker F1 Team	Spyker F8-VII	Ferrari 056 2.4 V8	AUS Ret	MAL Ret	BHR 14	ESP 14	MON 19	CAN Ret	USA 15	FRA Ret	GBR 15	EUR	HUN	TUR	ITA	BEL	JPN	CHN	BRA			22nd ★	0 ★

★ Season in progress

Complete DTM results

References

1.
Spkyer drops Albers
2. Christijan Albers married his fiancee Liselore Kooijman
3. "Albers re-signs with Spyker MF1", Grandprix.com article dated September 29, 2006.
4. http://www.pitpass.com/fes_php/pitpass_news_item.php?fes_art_id=31966
5. http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/60436
6. Sack Albers, Lauda tells Spyker, FIA
7. ''"Christijan Albers loses Spyker drive"'' ITV Sport Retrieved 10 July 2007
8. Winkelhock name to return to F1
9. Albers returns at Spyker next week

External links

★ The official website for Christijan Albers

★ Christijan Albers career statistics at Driver Database