Marcus Ericsson
Marcus Thorbjörn Ericsson is a Swedish racing driver, who competes in the IndyCar Series for Andretti. Ericsson competed in Formula One from to. In American open-wheel racing, Ericsson won the Indianapolis 500 in 2022 with Chip Ganassi Racing.
Born and raised in Kumla, Ericsson began competitive kart racing aged nine, winning several national titles. After a successful debut in car racing in 2007 which saw him take the British Formula BMW title with Fortec Motorsport, he moved up into the British team's British Formula Three Championship squad. After finishing as one of the top rookies in the category, Ericsson turned his attentions to the All-Japan Formula Three Championship where he won the championship in his debut year. In 2010, he moved up to the GP2 Series where he secured one victory during his maiden campaign for Super Nova Racing. Between 2011 and 2012, Ericsson drove for iSport. Ericsson completed the 2013 GP2 season with DAMS, and debuted in Formula One in with Caterham F1.
Early career
Karting
Marcus Thorbjörn Ericsson was born on 2 September 1990 in Kumla, Örebro County, Sweden. Ericsson's first taste of motorsport came when he was nine years old racing in karts. "I got a call from Fredrik Ekblom, whom I ran in British Formula 3000 and Indy Lights. He now runs a kart circuit and he told me about a nine-year-old kid who'd walked in off the street and nearly broke the lap record", recalled Richard Dutton, head of Fortec Motorsport. Ekblom managed to convince Ericsson's father, Tomas, to buy his son a kart and the young Swede stayed in karting for the next four years, "I'd never really thought about racing as a career. My family didn't have the money for me to race formula cars so we never thought about it", Ericsson said.In 2006, Ericsson's career got backing from former Champ Car driver and 1999 Indianapolis 500 winner Kenny Bräck, who said:
I spotted Marcus at a race in Gothenburg. He didn't win the race because his engine blew up with two laps to go but he was clearly the best out there. He didn't get caught in any battles when passing – he'd just wait for the right opportunity, then he pounced and he was away. He has such patience but when he does go for it, it measures so perfectly. He reminded me of watching Alain Prost.
File:Marcus Ericsson Brands Hatch 2007.jpg|thumb|left|Ericsson won his second Formula BMW race at Brands Hatch by six seconds.
Formula BMW
Bräck convinced Richard Dutton, who ran Bräck in the British Formula Three Championship in 1989, to race Ericsson for his Fortec Motorsport team's 2007 Formula BMW UK title challenge. Ericsson said of his chances during the season, "I was thinking that I should be around top eight to start with, trying for podiums and maybe wins by the end of the year". Ericsson's first win came at the first meeting of the series at Brands Hatch where he took third place in the first race and won from pole position in the second race. Following his win, Ericsson was described by Autosport as "the best young talent" Bräck had ever seen. Ericsson was in the title race for the whole season, challenging Czech Josef Král and Brit Henry Arundel. In the end, Ericsson, aged 16, won the title by 40 points from Kral, becoming the final Champion of the British Formula BMW series before the series merged with the German series to make a European championship.Formula Three
Following his win of the Formula BMW title, Ericsson began aiming for a seat in Formula Three. Tests followed with the British Formula 3 team Räikkönen Robertson Racing as part of his prize for winning the title that year. Afterward Ericsson had a test with frontrunning Formula 3 Euro Series team ASM, later ART Grand Prix. Despite an offer to join ASM, Ericsson opted to stay in England and join Fortec's British Formula 3 team. Ericsson received with two pole positions and a handful of podium finishes, but no victories, which gave him fifth overall in the championship.File:Marcus Ericsson 2009 Macau F3.jpg|thumb|right|Ericsson driving for TOM'S at the 2009 Macau Grand Prix, where he finished fourth
During the winter of 2008, Ericsson signed a contract with the Japanese F3 team TOM'S to compete full-time in the championship for the upcoming 2009 season. Ericsson said that he was more likely to gain the experience needed to win the Macau Grand Prix in comparison to competing further in the British championship. Ericsson won the Japanese F3 championship and also won races when making guest appearances back in British F3. He consequently participated in the Macau Grand Prix where he qualified in pole position and finished the main race in the fourth position.
GP2 Series
Ericsson moved into the GP2 Asia Series for the 2009–10 GP2 Asia Series, driving originally for the ART Grand Prix team. However, it was later confirmed that Ericsson would drive for Super Nova Racing in the 2010 GP2 Series, although he was replaced with Jake Rosenzweig for the final two rounds. Ericsson returned to Super Nova for the GP2 Series, partnering Josef Král and later Luca Filippi. He took his first series victory at Valencia, but only scoring points on two further occasions restricted him to seventeenth place in the drivers' championship.File:M Ericsson Monza 2011.jpg|thumb|right|Ericsson driving for iSport at the Monza round of the 2011 GP2 Series
Ericsson switched to the iSport International team for 2011, alongside Sam Bird. He finished sixth in the Asia series championship, and tenth in the main series championship. He remained with iSport for 2012, alongside Jolyon Palmer. He won at Spa, beginning a run of six consecutive points finishes to the end of the season, including two podium finishes. This lifted him to eighth in the championship.
In 2013, Ericsson competed for the reigning champions DAMS, taking pole positions in Spain and Great Britain. In Germany, he won the feature race, and he continued with podium positions in Hungary, Belgium, Singapore, and Abu Dhabi to finish sixth in the championship.
Formula One
Ericsson drove for Brawn GP at the young driver test at Circuito de Jerez over three days, on 1–3 December 2009. He tested alongside IndyCar Series driver Mike Conway. Conway had the edge by three-tenths of a second, however team principal Ross Brawn commended Ericsson for his performance, saying that he had "performed very well showing exceptional maturity in his approach and feedback".Ericsson has described his five seasons in Formula One, which encompasses 97 Grand Prix starts, as mentally challenging, in contrast to his later success in IndyCar.
Caterham (2014)
On 21 November 2013, It was announced that Ericsson was a candidate to drive for the Caterham F1 Team in 2014 with Kamui Kobayashi as teammate. On 21 January 2014, the team announced that Ericsson and Kobayashi would be their race driver line up for the forthcoming season, with Robin Frijns as reserve.File:Ericsson 2014 Monaco Grand Prix.jpg|thumb|left|Ericsson during the 2014 Monaco Grand Prix where he wore a special helmet in tribute to famous Swedish Formula One driver Ronnie Peterson
Ericsson qualified 20th in his debut race– the 2014 Australian Grand Prix, running 11th before he fell back with oil pressure problems. In Malaysia, he qualified last, finishing 14th in front of main rival Max Chilton. In Spain, he outqualified Kobayashi for the first time in his career, but he was behind both Marussia cars. He finished the race in 20th position, the last classified finisher. In the next race, the, he was involved in a collision with Williams driver Felipe Massa during qualifying, which resulted in Massa not advancing to the second part of the qualifying session. Ericsson was penalised with two penalty points and had to start from the pit lane. He finished in 11th place, just missing out on his and Caterham's first points.
After this, Ericsson suffered a crash in the rain in Hungary, when he lost control of his car on the exit of turn three and hit the barriers. He was unhurt, but the car was destroyed. In the he battled with the Marussias again, losing 16th place to Chilton on the penultimate lap. In Singapore, he finished in 15th place and in Japan, he out-qualified both Marussias and Kobayashi for 19th position. He started 17th, but spun behind the safety car in heavy rain, and had to fight back from last place. He finished 17th, in front of both Marussias and Kobayashi, but his performance was overshadowed by the crash of Bianchi. At the inaugural, he qualified in a career-best 17th position, missing out on making it into Q2 by only 0.15 seconds. During the race, he started 16th but fell back, finishing 19th overall but in front of his main rivals– the other Caterham and the sole Marussia of Chilton, who both eventually retired from the race.
Due to Caterham F1 falling into administration on 21 October 2014, neither team driver was able to compete at the. Despite this, Ericsson flew to Texas to commentate the race for Swedish television and secured a new drive for 2015. Ericsson terminated his contract with Caterham on 12 November. He eventually finished the season in 19th position, highest of the Caterham drivers that took part in.
Sauber (2015–2019)
2015
At the 2014 United States Grand Prix, on 1 November 2014, Sauber announced that it had signed Ericsson for . In his first race with the team in Australia, Ericsson finished in eighth position, recording the first points-scoring finish by a Swedish driver since Stefan Johansson finished third at the 1989 Portuguese Grand Prix.Malaysia was the first time that Ericsson made it into Q3, qualifying 10th but was ultimately promoted to ninth. He spun on the fourth lap after an unsuccessful overtaking attempt on Force India's Nico Hülkenberg which resulted in retirement. In China, Ericsson again made it into Q3 in qualifying, again qualifying tenth. He finished the race in the same position, scoring one point after Max Verstappen's engine failed with only a few laps remaining. In Bahrain he qualified outside the top-ten, and held eighth position when a pit stop error caused him to fall down the field, and he ultimately finished the race in 14th position. In the first European leg of the season he finished 14th in Spain and 13th in Monaco.
In the 2015 British Grand Prix he finished 11th – just outside the points. He scored one more point before the summer break, with a tenth-place finish in Hungary, followed by another tenth position in Belgium. At the Ericsson qualified for Q3, where he ended up tenth, before he was given a grid penalty for blocking Nico Hülkenberg in Q1. Ericsson eventually finished ninth– taking his fifth points position for the year and again being in front of teammate Felipe Nasr.During the summer break, Sauber announced that Ericsson along with Nasr had both extended their deals with the team for the 2016 season.