Sébastien Buemi-The Daily Ledger

Sébastien Olivier Buemi (; born 31 October 1988) is a Swiss professional racing driver, who competes in the FIA Formula E Championship for Envision Racing. He competed for Scuderia Toro Rosso in Formula One from 2009 to 2011. After leaving Formula One, Buemi became a reserve driver for Scuderia Toro Rosso's sister team, Red Bull Racing from 2012 to 2013. He returned to Red Bull Racing in 2019 as a reserve driver.

Buemi has competed in the FIA World Endurance Championship with Toyota Gazoo Racing (formerly Toyota Racing) since 2012. He became the 2014 World Endurance Champion in the LMP1 class. He won both the 2018 24 Hours of Le Mans and, subsequently, the 2018-19 WEC Championship. He also won the 2019, 2020 and 2022 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Sébastien Buemi

Buemi has raced FIA Formula E Championship with e.dams Renault (now Nissan Formula E Team) since 2014. He won the Formula E Championship in 2015–16. Buemi also became part of the Nismo Global Driver Exchange.

Sébastien Buemi

Early career

Formula BMW

Born in Aigle, Vaud, Buemi graduated from karting and spent 2004 and 2005 in German Formula BMW, finishing third and second in the championship respectively. He was also runner up in the 2005 FBMW World Final.

Sébastien Buemi

Formula Three

Following a single race in Spanish Formula Three in 2005, Buemi moved up to the Formula Three Euroseries for 2006, finishing 12th in the championship, ceding 11th place to Charlie Kimball on countback. He remained in the series for 2007, and finished second in the championship, behind Romain Grosjean. He has also competed in the special Masters of Formula 3 and Macau Grand Prix races.

A1 Grand Prix

For the 2006–07 A1 Grand Prix season, Buemi shared driving duties for A1 Team Switzerland with Neel Jani and Marcel Fässler. The team finished eighth in the championship.

GP2 Series

Buemi was drafted in at short notice to replace the injured Michael Ammermüller at ART Grand Prix for the Monaco round of the 2007 GP2 Series season. He performed creditably on his GP2 début, qualifying fourth and finishing seventh. He joined the Arden International team for the 2008 GP2 Asia Series, and finished as runner-up with a win and four second places. He continued with the team for the main 2008 season. He scored his first win in the French sprint race, starting 21st on the grid (after a technical problem in the feature race) on slick tyres on a drying track and benefitting as most rivals had to pit for slicks. He won one more race and ended the season sixth in the championship.

Formula One

On 18 September 2007 he drove the Red Bull RB3 at the F1 test session in Jerez. He was third quickest on the day, behind Timo Glock (BMW) and Vitantonio Liuzzi (Scuderia Toro Rosso) but ahead of names such as Rubens Barrichello (Honda) and Nelson Piquet Jr. (Renault). On 16 January 2008 Red Bull Racing confirmed Buemi as their test and reserve driver for the 2008 season. At the 2008 Japanese Grand Prix, Buemi drove the medical car as usual driver Dr Jacques Tropenat had been suffering from an ear problem. Buemi also drove the medical car at the Chinese Grand Prix and Brazilian Grand Prix.

Scuderia Toro Rosso (2009–2011)

2009

Scuderia Toro Rosso confirmed its signing of Buemi as one of its race drivers on 9 January 2009. He was the first Swiss driver to take part in an F1 race since Jean-Denis Délétraz drove for Pacific at the 1995 European Grand Prix.

In his first race, the 2009 Australian Grand Prix, Buemi outqualified his teammate Sébastien Bourdais and then scored a point in the race by finishing in eighth position. He was later promoted to seventh place as a result of Lewis Hamilton being disqualified. At the Chinese Grand Prix, he scored another point, this time in the wet, finishing eighth after starting tenth. After a mid season dip in the Toro Rosso's form, Buemi rounded off a good weekend to finish 7th in the 2009 Brazilian Grand Prix. He followed this with a third top ten qualification in a row and another points finish at the season finale in Abu Dhabi. Buemi finished the year sixteenth with 6 points as the best rookie.