Team Lotus

Celebrity bio

2006 saw Heikki Kovalainen make the step up to the very pinnacle of world motorsport, replacing Frank Montagny as the Renault F1™ Team's third driver. A series of impressive displays in testing saw him achieve his primary Formula 1™ goal, with the announcement he had been promoted by the Renault F1™ Team to a full-time race seat for the 2007 season.

Pitted against the vastly experienced Giancarlo Fisichella, Heikki enjoyed an excellent debut season in 2007, out-performing and out-scoring his team-mate, becoming second best rookie of the season after Lewis Hamilton and taking a very credible seventh place in the final Championship standings.

These achievements did not go unnoticed, and in December 2007 Team Vodafone McLaren Mercedes announced Heikki as team-mate to Lewis Hamilton, a position he held for the 2008 and 2009 seasons, until the announcement of his appointment to Lotus Racing in 2009. 2008 saw Heikki claim both his first pole position, at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, and his first race win, at the Hungarian Grand Prix, where he became the 100th driver to win a Formula 1™ Grand Prix.

Having joined the new Lotus Racing team in 2009, Heikki finished 20th in the 2010 season and his heroic fire-fighting skills at the Singapore Grand Prix earned him the coveted title LG Moment of the Year.

In 2011 Heikki will be racing in the Team Lotus colours and is aiming to take the fight to the established midfield teams.

Jarno Trulli joined the Jordan Grand Prix squad for the new Millennium. It was another barren period for Jarno in terms of podium results but a handful of fourth places and some sublime qualifying performances attracted the attentions of the Renault team for 2002. His first year at the French manufacturer alongside Jenson Button did little to improve upon his previous results but in 2003, with the team's technical department led by Mike Gascoyne, he was given a more competitive car with which to show his full potential. Racing alongside Fernando Alonso, Jarno returned to the podium for the first time since his Prost days with third place in the German GP at Hockenheim. The result gave Jarno renewed confidence and paved the way for Jarno's breakthrough season in 2004.

Once again partnering Alonso, Jarno attained regular points and podium challenges before taking a breathtaking victory around the streets of Monte Carlo. Jarno had established himself as one of the men to beat but midway through the year relations with his team had started to deteriorate and towards the end of the year he opted for a surprise switch to Toyota with whom he would stay until 2009.

In his five-and-a-bit seasons with Toyota Jarno put in some incredible performances both in qualifying and in races. In his first full season with the team in 2005, with Mike Gascoyne at the technical helm, he was one of the Championship leaders in the early races taking Toyota's first ever podium results in Malaysia and Bahrain. Toyota's competitiveness dropped off after Gascoyne's departure from the team in 2006 and Jarno was only able to fight for occasional points finishes until a reversal of fortunes in 2008. His scored his first podium in three years at the French Grand Prix and Toyota were one of the teams to beat in the first races of 2009. Jarno took an incredible pole position in Bahrain but a miscalculated race strategy prevented him from converting it into the team's maiden victory. Nevertheless, with two podiums from the first four races and a highly competitive second place in the team's home race in Japan, Jarno ended the season - what would be Toyota's final in Formula 1™ - with some career-high performances.

Jarno had a tough 2010 season with Lotus Racing, with reliability issues repeatedly bringing his races to an early end. The switch to Red Bull Technology gearbox and hydraulic systems will go a long way to eradicating those issues and will give Jarno another chance to show the world exactly why he is regarded as being one of the sport's quickest ever one lap specialists, and a race winning driver.