Giovanni Lavaggi

Giovanni Lavaggi ( born February 18, 1958 in Augusta, Sicily ) is an Italian race car driver, team owner and racing car constructor.

Giovanni Lavaggi showed already the sport closely linked at a young age. At an early age he went rallies, denied ski races and flew hang gliders.

Beginnings and Formula 1

In 1989 he started with the professional motorsport. As a factory driver at Kremer Racing, he rose with a Porsche 962 in the sports car racing. About the Formula 3000 and the Champ Car made ​​it the Sicilians in 1995 to Formula 1 Lavaggi -bought himself a cockpit in the Pacific Formula 1 team and played for the under -funded racing team four World Cup races. In 1996 he moved to Minardi and was from the Grand Prix of Germany team-mate Pedro Lamy. After three races, the Formula 1 career of Lavaggi went without a world championship point at the end.

Again at Kremer

He returned to the sports car, where in 1995 again received a cockpit at Kremer Racing. Already in the 24- hour race at Daytona he could celebrate together with Jürgen Translucent, Christophe Bouchut and Marco Werner the biggest success of his career. After his final withdrawal from Formula 1 in 1996, he played one race apiece and the German and Italian GT Championship. After failing to qualify for the 24 - hour race at Le Mans in 1997, he went absolutely no sports car race this year.

Team owner GLV Brums

This should change in the second half of the following year, Lavaggi now drove a Ferrari F333 SP in the remaining four races of the FIA Sportscar Challenge for his newly established racing team GLV Brums, where he finished despite wechselter driver pairing, three of the four runs in the top five. 1999 drove Lavaggi continues for his own team, presented with Gastón Mazzacane now a solid teammate to his side. This constancy should pay off, so that the driver duo won the race at the Circuit de Nevers Magny -Cours and finished a further championship race on the podium. Since Mazzacane received a contract with the Formula 1 team Minardi in 2000, is Lavaggi had to look for a new teammates. Ultimately, he chose to Nicolas Filiberti, with whom he reached three other podium finishes. In addition Lavaggi tried to get his team a nomination at the 24 - hour race at Le Mans. The organizer ACO refused, but Lavaggi get a chance the race in a Porsche 996 GT3 R to take into attack. He, Jesús Diez de Villarroel and Tomas Saldaña, with whom he already in the early 90s at Kremer Racing, drove but fell after an accident prematurely. For the 2001 season, Lavaggi took an additional driver from the environment of Kremer Racing to his side. Christian Vann, who has already several years piloted a variety of GT cars, had last year denied some inserts in the FIA ​​Sportscar Challenge for Kremer. In addition Lavaggi let his Ferrari F333 SP retool the previously used Ferrari engine were replaced by a Judd GV4. First, the driver duo won the race at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza, but the vehicle in the remaining runs proved to be error prone and fell clutch, transmission and electronic problems from. The following year, he paused and his team completely and returned back to the last season of 2003 Sportscar Challenge. The team missed the first race of the series and appeared only at the Lausitzring with a Judd engine driven Ferrari F333 SP on. The cockpit team owner Lavaggi shared now with Xavier Pompidou, with the last but one he finished the race in 6th place. As the field was only slightly larger in Monza, Lavaggi ended his involvement in the series prematurely, but increased at the end of the season, the British team once again bustling Taurus Racing at 1000 km race at Spa -Francorchamps. He, Justin Keen and Larry Oberto missed the podium only just.

Le Mans Series

After the withdrawal from the FIA Sportscar Challenge yourself Lavaggi had to reorientate and drove in the Le Mans Endurance Series 2004 Ferrari 360 Modena GT. While he and Steeve Hiesse reached fifth place in the GT class at the 1000 km Nürburgring, the driver duo fell out in the remaining three races. 2005 Lavaggi paused again to present his self-designed Lavaggi LS1 for the 2006 season. To this end, he now reactivated his race team under the name Lavaggi sports, but could the Le Mans prototype running contrary to his original statements at the end of the year in Jarama. At his side, Xavier Pompidou was again reported, but the team missed the entire training, because the tuned by the company PME Ford engine had to be replaced. The race was hardly better, after 27 rounds had Lavaggi his vehicle off with an engine failure. The 2007 season was also characterized by problems with the engine, in the three races contested Lavaggi on the side of changing drivers, the car came with engine failure. Therefore, the team changed for the following year to a turbocharged engine of AER. Thus, the situation improved, but it was missing the car continues to reliability, defects on the starter and problems with the fuel pressure prevented the arrival of Lavaggi and Wolfgang Kaufmann at Monza and Spa-Francorchamps. At the Nürburgring the LS1, despite various problems with the cooling his first Zielankuft had, but fell because of its large residuum from scoring. Lavaggi renounced now a race on the Silverstone Circuit in favor of not belonging to the Championship 6- hour race at Vallelunga. There qualified merchant the LMP1 car on pole position, against less powerful LMP2 cars, group CN and GT classes. Renewed technical problems threw merchant and Lavaggi back, but in the end they were able to finish the race in 10th place overall. In 2009 Lavaggi participated only in two races of the Le Mans Series, but had to be adapted to its own construction on the revised Le Mans prototype control. In the 1000 - km race at Spa -Francorchamps he and Wolfgang Kaufmann started by technical problems throughout the weekend with late out of the box. Although the team finished the championship run, it fell to the leader of the rating due to the large residue. In the 1000 km race at the Nürburgring Lavaggi brought the car with clutch problems after 21 laps in the pits. After examination of the damages, the race was abandoned. The remaining championship races in Spain, Portugal and England did not contest the team, but Lavaggi was reported together with Wolfgang Kaufmann again at the 6- hour race at Vallelunga. After the organizer Gruppo Peroni let start the discharged as a separate race in previous years silver cup with touring cars along with the more powerful prototypes and sports cars, Lavaggi pulled the nomination back. Wolfgang Kaufmann about the situation:

" The difference in speed between a LMP1 car and the much slower touring car is already an enormous security risk is why we have withdrawn the nomination of the Scuderia Lavaggi. Vallelunga is a very fast race track with partially comprehensible passages. I was really looking forward together to contest the race in Vallelunga and Giovanni, at least we have here in 2008 stood on pole position and won the class. This year we wanted the overall victory, on the team Scuderia Lavaggi had been working extremely hard. "

Le Mans results

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