GP Racing

GP Racing was founded in 1997 Tancredi Pagiaro. His objective was clear: to become leaders. For this reason, he built a young but skilled team determined to stand out and to rise above the others.

After their entrance in Formula 3 in 1997, they debuted in the International FIA F3000 championship in 1998. The F3000 adventure lasted 2 years. Two years that allowed the team to gain significant experience and enviable technical knowledge.

Race after race the team became more united and motivated: GP Racing considers its engineers, technicians and mechanics as very important assets that need to be safeguarded. For this reason, the team who has a low turnover,guarantees stability and specific technical competence to the drivers.

2001 is the year that they participated in the newly founded Euro 3000 Series Championship. Right from the start, GP Racing was one of the leaders and finished the season in second place with Thomas Biagi.

2002 is once again a peak season: GP Racing is 4th out of the 14 teams that participated on the constructor’s classification.

In 2003 for the third consecutive year, GP Racing is competing in Euro 3000 Series Championship with promising young talents behind the wheel: the Italian Fabrizio Del Monte,the Russian Roman Rusinov and the young Belgian Maxime Hodencq who will replace Rusinov for the last two races.
Once again, it was a positive season for the team: Del Monte is second in the driver’s classification and GP Racing is in third place for the constructor’s title.

In 2004, GP Racing confirmed its position at the top in Superfund Euro 3000 as well. The title slipped out of Del Monte’s hands during the last race by one point only. The driver from Lazio , Italy conquered three wins, various podiums and was in the lead for 9 out of 10 races. A problem at the start of the last round took the joy of winning the much deserved title away from Fabrizio and GP Racing.

In 2005 GP Racing participated in the Italian F3000 Championship with the Lola BO2 driven by Fabrizio Del Monte and by the débuting Juan Caceres . The team also participated in the LMES Championship with the Promec (only one race in Monza ).

The Minardi Team by GP Racing, born from the new partnership between Gian Carlo Minardi and GP Racing , in 2006 competed with good results in the new Euroseries 3000, the continental championship born from the CSAI F.3000 Italian Trophy.

In 2007 a new challenge: GP Racing has entered also in GP2 Series thanks to the agreement with Piquet Sports, having created a new structure called Minardi Piquet Sports. It is a fantastic year: in Euroseries 3000 GP Racing wins the championship (both teams and drivers with Davide Rigon), while in GP2 reaches two podiums with Rodriguez and Negrao.

In 2008 it’s time for a triple challenge for GP Racing: GP2 Mains Series and GP2 Asia Series with the brand Piquet Sports, while Euroseries 3000 under his own name.

Piquet Sports

Piquet Sports was founded at the end of 2000 by the three times F1 World Champion Nelson Piquet.  Since its very beginning it was headed by Felipe Vargas, a well known and one of the most successful racing engineers in South America.  It started competing in the 2001 South American F3 Championship, just after Nelson Piquet Jr, son of three time F1 world champion, turned 16.  The team achieved 14 wins and conquered the 2002 South American F3 title with Nelson Jr. In 2003, Felipe Vargas and Nelson Piquet became partners and they established a base in England to compete in British F3 Series.

Since the beginning, they pitted themselves against F3 teams who had been competing for many years and the talented crew established themselves as a championship-winning outfit three times. It has two South American F3 Championship titles (2002 with Nelson Piquet Jr and 2004 with Xandy Negrão) and one British F3 Championship title (2004, with Nelson Piquet Jr). During the course of the 2003 and 2004 British F3 Championships, the team achieved 13 pole positions, 12 race wins and 24 podiums.

At the end of 2004 the team decided to graduate into the new GP2 Series. The team was granted one of the highly desired entries into the championship, having the resources and an ideal line up of drivers.  It was Nelson Piquet Jr and Xandi Negrão, whom had both won their respective championships with the team in 2004.

The beginning of the season started with a partnership with an existing British F3 team.  However, due to differing objectives, Piquet Sports decided to take over the whole GP2 venture. After a period of re-structuring, success soon came, resulting in impressive progress during the season. The team achieved one win and 5 podium finishes in 2005.

The team presented itself at the 2006 season fully grown up and with a real chance of winning the title. Nelson Piquet Jr. fought for the championship until the last round, achieving 4 wins, 9 podium finishes and 3 fastest laps. The results gave Nelson Piquet Jr. the second place in the GP2 Drivers’ championship and also put Piquet Sports in second place in the GP2 Teams Championship.

At the end of 2006, having established itself as one of the top teams in GP2 Championship, the team started to look into opportunities to strength its foundations and have a financial background to enable them to subsidize the budget of prospective championship winning drivers. An attractive proposal was offered by GP Racing, another established racing team competing in different classes. They had a great desire and potential to grow based on a strong financial backing from its partners and a very attractive sponsorship portfolio born from the association of the two well known names in Motorsport: Minardi and Piquet.

The two companies became partners and Piquet Sports started to compete as Minardi Piquet in 2007, moving its premises from England to Italy. In 2008 Piquet Sports has a new double challenge: GP2 Mains Series with Pastor Maldonado and Andreas Zuber, GP2 Asia Series with Marco Bonanomi and Marcello Puglisi.