Shinji Nakano
Shinji Nakano is a Japanese professional racing driver.
Nakano's father, Tsuneharu, was also a racing driver. He competed in the All-Japan Formula Three Championship.
Formula One Career
Nakano made his debut at the 1997 Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne for the Prost Grand Prix team, owned by legendary four times Formula One World Champion Alain Prost. The season saw him score two world championship points with a pair of sixth places.
With his place at Prost heavily reliant on their engine partners Mugen-Honda, Nakano was dropped in favour of Jarno Trulli, with the second cockpit taken by Olivier Panis, when Prost switched to Peugeot engines. He subsequently joined Minardi for the season, alongside Esteban Tuero.
Nakano struggled in the under-powered, under-financed Italian team. He failed to score any points in 1998 and bowed out of Formula One racing for good at his home Grand Prix at Suzuka, Japan, having contested a total of 33 Grands Prix. He spent as an occasional test driver for the Jordan team, which also used Mugen-Honda engines.
After Formula One
After Formula One, Nakano went to race in CART for Walker Racing and Fernandez Racing. He made 56 starts from 2000 to 2002 with a best points finish of seventeenth in 2002 and a best race result of fourth at the 2002 Molson Indy Toronto. He also started fifteenth in the 2003 Indianapolis 500 for Beck Motorsports, finishing fourteenth. He competed in the 2006 and 2008 24 Hours of Le Mans races and returned to the event in 2011 with OAK Racing and 2012 with the Boutsen Ginon squad.
Helmet
Nakano's helmet was black with a black circle on the top surrounded by a white halo, with a red and silver flame design surrounding the visor and a black and silver checkered flag behind of it, in CART he changed the black for white, the halo became blue, the black circle became red, the checkered flag disappeared and the flame became red with blue outline. in LeMans, he added more flames in the point where the checkered flag was.
Media appearances
Since 2016, Nakano has served as a commentator on Formula One races for DAZN Japan. He was a guest on the TV Asahi variety programme Aruaru Gijido in March 2017.
Career statistics
Complete Formula One results
Driver did not finish the Grand Prix, but was classified as they had completed over 90% of the race distance.