Sakon
Yamamoto

Sakon Yamamoto was born on 9 July 1982 in Toyohashi, Japan. He began karting in 1994 at the Suzuka Circuit Racing School and worked his way up from there. At the 2005 Japanese Grand Prix he took part in the weekend as third driver for Jordan.

In June 2006 he became a test driver for Super Aguri, running in Friday practice sessions. At the German Grand Prix he took over the second car from Franck Montagny. After retiring from his first four races, he reached the chequered flag for the first time in China, in sixteenth place, and he ended the season with three finishes in a row. The race seat for 2007 went to Anthony Davidson, so Yamamoto stayed on as test driver and contested the 2007 GP2 Series with BCN Competicion. When Christijan Albers left Spyker, the team signed Yamamoto for the rest of the season, and his first race for them in Hungary ended in a crash on lap 4. He was classified 26th in the 2006 world championship and 24th in 2007.

In 2008 he was a Renault test driver, although only for public demonstrations. He returned to GP2 midway through the year with ART Grand Prix and finished fourth in the sprint race in Hungary. He then took ninth place in the 2008-09 GP2 Asia Series. In 2010 he was test and reserve driver for HRT. He raced seven times that season, the first of them at the British Grand Prix, and finished fifteenth in Korea. He ended that season 26th in the standings. In total he made 21 Formula One starts. In 2011 Marussia Virgin Racing announced that he would be the team's reserve driver for the first three races of the season.

In 2015 he replaced António Félix da Costa at Amlin Aguri for the London ePrix in Formula E. In 2020 he entered the final round of Super Formula Lights at Fuji for B-Max.

Source: Wikipedia, “Sakon Yamamoto”. Text licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.