Ryan Sharp

Infobox racing driver
name = Ryan Sharp


pixels =
caption =
nationality = flagicon|UK British
date of birth = Birth date and age|1979|4|29
place of birth = Newtonhill, Scotland
related to =
current series = FIA GT Championship
first year = 2007
current team = Jetalliance Racing
car number =
former teams =
starts = 12
wins = 5
poles = 0
fastest laps =
best finish = 2nd
year = 2007
prev series = World Touring Car Championship
GP2 Series
World Series by Renault
Formula Renault V6 Eurocup
Formula Renault 2.0 Germany
Formula Renault 2.0 Italia
Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0
Formula Renault 2.0 UK
British Formula Ford
prev series years = 2006
2005
2005
2003-2004
2003
2003
2002-2003
2001-2002
2000-2001
titles = Formula Renault 2.0 Germany
title years = 2003
awards =
award years =

Ryan Sharp is a race car driver born in Newtonhill, Scotland, United Kingdom on April 29 1979. He is racing in the FIA GT Championship in 2007 with JetAlliance Racing in their lead #33 Aston Martin DBR9 - with Ex-F1 Driver Karl Wendlinger as his team-mate. Ryan was also the 2003 German Formula Renault champion.

Career History

Ryan's career began in Karting, as it does with many drivers, winning a number of local and national Karting events, his talent was spotted by Dutch businessman Klass Zwart, who funded Ryan's early racing - his first season of car racing in Junior Formula Ford.

Ryan progressed well despite limited funding to compete, and in 2002 moved from Formula Ford into the Formula Renault Championship, a true 'slicks and wings' series, as opposed to Formula Ford which has no aerodynamic wings.

Formula Renault

Ryan's first season in Formula Renault was in the UK, with the John Village Automotive team, he managed to finish 6th in the championship, despite racing a few rounds with a car with a damaged tub (a fault that took the team a few races to track down), which dropped him down the championship. Ironically, his consistency in finishing every race in the points dropped him to 6th due to the Formula Renault system of dropping your lowest score through the season - meaning Ryan had to drop points while those around him dropped a '0' they had scored during the season.

For 2003, Ryan took a risky career move - moving out of the UK scene to race in Formula Renault in Germany with the Jenzer Motorsport team. The move paid off handsomely, with Ryan winning the championship by 40 points, and showing competitively in the Formula Renault Masters event at Donnington in October 2003 - Winning the first of the 2 races, and finishing 3rd in the 2nd (he was leading the race, but a backmarker caused a red flag and on countback Ryan was classified 3rd). British racing hotshot Lewis Hamilton came over to Germany during the season to race with the German Formula Renault grid, Ryan won both of the races and Hamilton finished 9th and 8th respectively - his own website admitting afterwards that "despite Lewis' pace, he wasn't within a second a lap of the race leader!"Ryan also took part in a round of the Italian Formula Renault championship at Spa, in Belgium. Running in another competitive field (considered by some to be the most competitive FRenault championship in the world) at a circuit new to him in the pouring rain, Ryan went on to win race 1 by 12 seconds and was on course to win the 2nd until he made an error and damaged his car, failing to finish that race – but up to that point giving another example of his wet-weather skills.

Formula Renault v6

2004 saw Ryan continue his relationship with the Jenzer Motorsport team, moving up the Formula Renault V6 Eurocup. The season started quite well, finishing 3rd and 1st at the first weekend (3rd in Race 1 after spinning at Turn 1 and dropping right to the back of the field), and then 2 2nd places at the following races in Valencia - he was leading those races, but an amount of inexperience at this level meant his tyres were being worked too hard and he lost pace at the end of both races, being passed by Damien Pasini and Robbie Kerr respectively for those race wins - nevertheless these first 4 rounds left him with a commanding lead at the head of the championship. The season moved to Magny Cours where Ryan consolidated his championship lead. The F1 support race at Monaco is where problems began, a car failure in the race meant that he gave away valuable points in the championship and a disappointing performance at Brno followed - caused by engine damage at Monaco that the team was unable to trace. Coupled with a disappointing run at his home races at Donnington meant that the Championship tightened up considerably. Eventually Ryan lost the championship to Swiss/French driver Giorgio Mondini by 22 points.

GP2 Series

Ryan moved up to the new GP2 Series in 2005 with David Price Racing, a team he had raced against in 2004 and who were very impressed with his performances in 2004. The season began in Imola where the cars had teething trouble with Clutches amongst other things, in the 2nd round at Barcelona, Ryan was on course for a 3rd place finish when the car failed forcing him to start at the back of the grid for race 2, in which he set the fastest lap of the race and gained 1 point. A series of disappointing performances followed, which were in no way beneficial to Ryan's sponsors, or to his career, these performances were attributed to the team being poorly engineered and set up - making it almost impossible to drive it competitively. Ryan left the GP2 series, and returned to Jenzer Motorsport to compete in the last few rounds of the Formula Renault 3.5l championship, and almost immediately the results/performances picked up - demonstrating that the David Price Racing car wasn't a competitive car, regardless of who would be driving it. Ryan was replaced at DPR by 2004 FRenault v6 Champion Giorgio Mondini, who also struggled to get anything out of the car.

World Touring Car Championship (WTCC)

Ryan's career took a new direction in 2006 - signing for the Italian JAS Motorsport team to contest the Word Touring Car Championship, running as an Independent in the Yokohama Independent Trophy. He impressed many people in this season, becoming the first Independent driver to score an "overall" podium position in the season, finishing 3rd overall in Race 1 at Puebla, Mexico. Ryan won a number of races during the season (class victories), the most memorable being one of the races at Brands Hatch, UK - where he won in the pouring rain, underlining his wet-weather driving skills. He was on course to finish 2nd in the championship behind Dutchman Tom Coronel, but had to miss the last 3 rounds of the Championship due to budget issues (the last round had double points, so it was effectively 4 rounds/a maximum of 80 points missed out on).

FIA GT Championship

Ryan moved again in 2007, to the FIA GT Championship with Austrian team JetAlliance Racing, who are only in their 2nd season of competition themselves. The season began in Zhuhai in China, where the car finished 9th – this was followed by 2 4th place finishes at Silverstone and Bucharest, the upward spiral in form continued to the next race in Monza where the duo won a dramatic race. Oschersleben held no such luck as the car was hit at the start of the race, dropping right to the back, and eventually retired. The last race they took part in was the Total 24 Hours of Spa, in which the car qualified 2nd on the grid and ran very well - the car was leading at the 6 hour mark, and so was awarded half points for a race win (5 points). Unfortunately the car retired around 40 minutes after this and the duo lost more points in the championship race. A strong finish to the season, including 2 further wins in Adria, in the night race, and Zolder in the 10th and final round saw Ryan and team-mate Wendlinger shoot up the standings to finish 2nd in the championship, 4 points behind eventual champion, Tomas Biagi.

Sponsors

Norco Group Limited

Norco Group Limited is based in Aberdeen, Scotland and operating throughout the UK - Norco are Ryan's main sponsor. Norco specialise in the supply and management of industrial battery and charger fleets for both materials handling and critical power systems.Headed up by Chief Exectutive Stephen Park, Norco has continued to support Ryan throughout his career.Ryan says "This type of sponsorship and entertainment package works by increasing the brand awareness and profile of the company which is even more significant now I am racing in an international arena."

James Keiller Estates Limited

James Keiller Estates Limited is a property company based in Dundee, Scotland. Ryan has been supported throughout by the owner, Bruce Linton.

Racing record

Complete GP2 Series results

() (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in "italics" indicate fastest lap)

See also

*JetAlliance Racing
*Karl Wendlinger
*2007 FIA GT Championship season

Links

* [http://www.ryansharpracing.com/ Ryan Sharp's Website]
* [http://www.norcoenergy.com/ Norco Group Limited Website]
* [http://www.commercial-properties-scotland.co.uk/ James Keiller Estates Limited Website]
* [http://www.fiagt.com/driverinfo.php?drivername=Ryan%20Sharp Ryan Sharp's FIA GT Profile]

Sources

* [http://www.ryansharpracing.com/ Ryan Sharp official website]
* [http://www.fiagt.com/driverinfo.php?drivername=Ryan%20Sharp Profile] - from [http://www.fiagt.com/ FIA GT official website]