Christijan Albers
Christijan, the son of a Dutch Rallycross ace André Albers, began racing karts at a young age and won the Dutch National Championship in 1997, despite having already switched his attention to racing in Formula Ford claiming both the Dutch and Belgian titles that same season. Just to show his versatility, Albers also took a Renault Megane to victory at the Zandvoort Marlboro Masters meeting and not surprisingly he was now regarded as a hot property.
For 1998 Christijan made his the German F3 series, taking wins in both races at the July Norisring meeting in his Dallara F983, eventually finishing a creditable fifth in the final standings. Back for more the following year this time with Bertram Schafer’s crack team, despite some bad luck, Albers blinding speed proved too much for the competition as he emerged a convincing champion taking six victories from 18 races.
This led to a step up to the International F3000 championship alongside Mark Webber in Paul Stoddart’s European Aviation team. In truth, Albers was on occasion, overwhelmed by the sheer depth of quality of the field, but he nearly scored a point at Magny Cours finishing seventh. At was at this point he decided to turn his back on single seater racing and take up an offer to race for Mercedes in the DTM, albeit in a year-old car with Team Persson. The decision proved to be a good one for the Dutchman, although he only managed a single second place against a whole host of strong 'works' opposition he was given a place Rosberg team for 2002. Once more he impressed and when Uwe Alzen quit suddenly at the beginning of 2003 Christijan found himself in a fully backed works Mercedes.
Taking on the vastly experienced Berndt Schneider in equal machinery was certainly no easy task, but Albers carried the fight right up until the final race at Hochenheim, where a puncture halted his challenge for the title. Nevertheless four wins and runner-up had cemented his reputation as a top line driver in the category. His performances had not gone unnoticed by both the Minardi and Jordan teams, but Christijan opted for a fourth season of DTM and despite a brilliant win at Estoril his chances of winning the title were marred by errors at Oschersleben and Brno which saw him eventually finish third behind Audi’s Mattias Ekstrom and the Mercedes of Gary Paffett.
After a brief flirtation of a the possible switch Champ Car racing, Albers grabbed the chance to step up to Formula 1 in 2005 joining the perennial backmarkers Minardi. In truth Paul Stoddart was running short of funds to keep the team afloat but he eventually produced a completely new car (the PS05) in time for the start of the European season, however the lack resources translated into issues of reliability. Even though, Albers was to bring the car to finish in thirteen races. The highlight his season was of course the infamous en-mass withdrawal of the Michelin runners just before the start of the U.S. Grand Prix that gave Albers an unexpected opportunity to register his first World Championship points picking up fifth place in the six-car field. Apart from this bizarre race however, the summit of his ambitions was besting his team-mates (initially Friesacher and later Doornbos) or either of the two Jordan cars as part of the quartet that made up the back end of the grid.
Christijan had showed more than enough flashes of promise to find a place with the Midland Team now running in their own colours following the purchase of Jordan early in 2005. But, inevitably without a comparable budget to most of the opposition his efforts brought no rewards in terms of tangible success. Tenth in Hungary was nearest Albers came to a points scoring finish, but the late season of the team by a consortium headed by the Dutch car maker Spyker, promised better days ahead.
With the design skills of Mike Gascoyne and Ferrari power in 2007, Albers, was promoted to de-facto number one in the team. Unfortunately for the amiable Dutchman, his rookie teammate Adrian Sutil was soon proving to be the faster charge with Albers struggling to match his pace.
Albers tenure in the team was on shaky ground following a disastrous gaffe at a pit stop during the French Grand Prix that saw him drive off with a re-fuelling hose still attached to his Spyker. Blithely trailing the offending attachment around part the Magny Cours circuit merely worsened his cause. A week later he brought his car to the finish in the British Grand Prix without any dramas, but with his sponsorship money reportedly drying up, the Dutchman lost his place to Marcus Winkelhock, who was followed in short order by the well-funded Sakon Yamamoto.
His Formula 1 career at an end, Albers eventually found himself a way back into racing. He will compete in the DTM once more in 2008, having secured a deal to run a two-year old Audi for the Futurecom TME team.
