British driver Jann Mardenborough has taken a unique path into a motor racing career. One that today places him the fastest rookie and puts him close to the front in Toyota Racing Series free practice sessions as the championship heads to the penultimate round, three days of intense race action at Hampton Downs in the north Waikato.
Most of his rivals in this year’s TRS have taken the accepted and ‘traditional’ path into their motorsport careers. They have arrived in New Zealand with five or more years of karting experience behind them and a progression through from karting into lower categories before making the step up to full ‘wings and slicks’ categories. Some have raced in TRS before – Invercargill’s Damon leitch ins in his third championship season. British driver Alex Lynn raced here isn 2011 and is back with his eye on the title – rated by many the danger man in the series.
In stark contrast, Jann Mardenborough has two seasons of GT racing behind him and is in his first ever single-seater drive. He shot to prominence by excelling at what many parents might consider a dreadful waste of teen talent and time: online race gaming.
The slightly-built 21 year old had an early and brief flirtation with karting but despite showing promise ended up stepping away from motorsport aged 11, the family unable to fund the typical motor racing career which starts for many young stars in junior karting at the tender age of five or six and delivers them into premier single-seater racing a decade later.
Jann’s interest went toward computer gaming, and in particular the realistic racing world of Gran Turismo. This shy Cardiff teenager would spend hours in his room honing his skills in the digital world – an obsession that might seem quite divorced from the gritty reality of weekend after weekend at kart tracks.
In an industry often accused of stunting the development of young people, Gran Turismo stands out for its focus on mirroring true racing experience. More than any of its rivals, Gran Turismo is a racing “simulator” and its success (more than 60 million sales worldwide) can be measured by its success in doing so.
For Jann, the online world of race gaming would provide a short cut to the big time. In mid-2011 he entered the Nissan/Sony Playstation GT Academy, a global racer gaming competition that attracts 160,000 or more aspiring racers. Part of the prize on offer is driver tuition and a chance to qualify to race a Nissan GT race car.
That prize went to Mardenborough, and he defeated 90,000 other teen racers to win it. The prize brought him a chance to race at the Dubai 24-hour event in a Nissan race car.
Racing as part of a team of drivers, Mardenborough brought the big sports car home third.
Now, with driver training, racing, media training and so much more on his side, Mardenborough exudes the practiced, confident ease of the professional racer. It’s a far cry from the 17 year old who was once too shy to answer the phone at home.
He knows he is being watched closely when he grid up this weekend for the Toyota Racing Series, but says he is looking to learn from the intense five-weekend, fifteen race championship, with the goal of securing a European open-wheeler drive and possibly racing at the Le Mans 24-Hour endurance event.
The driver he admires most? Formula One racer Lewis Hamilton, who was “discovered”by Mclaren boss Ron Dennis. The two have been compared favourably by UK media, though Mardenborough is humble enough to brush aside such an ambitious speculation.
He is happy with the progress he has made in just two short years, and looking forward to sharpening his skills in TRS.
The raw potential of the young racer is obvious after three rounds of the championship. He is consistently the fastest rookie, usually in the top ten and often in the top five on the timesheets. The opening round set the scene: in just two “proper” practice sessions at Teretonga, he was second fastest behind Lucas Auer, nephew of F1 great Gerhard Berger and himself rated a serious TRS championship title hope.
