Raul
Boesel

Raul Boesel was born in Curitiba on 4 December 1957. He studied engineering, but left his degree unfinished and turned to motor racing. In 1979 he took part in the first season of the Brazilian Stock Car championship. He moved to Britain in 1980 to race in Formula Ford 1600, and in 1981 he finished third in the Formula 3 championship. He tested for McLaren in November 1981.

Boesel drove in Formula One for March in 1982 and for Ligier in 1983. In 1982 he started 10 of his 15 entries, and in 1983 he started 13 of 15. That made 23 starts in total, without a podium finish. At the end of 1983 he went to the United States to race in CART.

In sports cars he won the World Sportscar Championship with Jaguar in 1987, taking five victories on the way. In 1988 he won the 24 Hours of Daytona in a Jaguar XJR-9, sharing the car with Martin Brundle and John Nielsen. He also raced in CART again that year and finished third at Indianapolis in 1989. In 1991 he took second place at Le Mans with Jaguar, and in 1993 he finished fifth in the CART standings.

He also raced in the Indy Racing League. He ended his professional career in 2005 after a return to Stock Car Brasil. The Autódromo Internacional de Curitiba is officially nicknamed Circuito Raul Boesel, in recognition of his success in Europe.

Source: Wikipedia, “Raul Boesel”. Text licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.