Rubens Barrichello

- Published on Dec 15th, 2010 by The Badger

Life Before F1
After success in karting Rubens moved to Europe in 1990, suffered severe homesickness but still managed to win the Formula Opel championship. He progressed to British F3 for 1991 and beat David Coulthard to the title to mark himself out as a real talent of the future and, after finishing third in his debut Formula 3000 season, landed an F1 driver with Jordan. Close-to two decades and over 300 Grand Prix later he's still in the sport.

F1 Career
Barrichello debuted for Jordan in 1993 but didn't reigster points until the penultimate race in Japan. He was retained for 1994 and started the season well, taking a podium at round two, but suffered a horrific shunt and the loss of mentor Ayrton Senna at the next race in San Marino. He recovered well, scoring regular points to finish the year sixth overall. More good results followed in '95 and '96 before a switch to newboys Stewart.

Here he impressed more - a podium at Monaco '97 was stunning, and a tough '98 was followed by a very strong 1999. That earned him a move to the team he'd always dreamed of driving for: Ferrari.

But this wasn't the paradise he'd hoped for. The cars were always quick, but so was team-mate Michael Schumacher - and this was his team. Rubens won nine races for the Scuderia and was twice championship runner-up but was never allowed to challenge Shumacher, on occasion being ordered to hand wins to the German. He left at the end of 2005 feeling none to happy with the way the team had treated him

He then moved to Honda, where he enjoyed a solid 2006, but in 2007 and 2008 the team produced real pigs. The first saw Rubens score zero points for the only time in his career, and whilst he did score a podium in 2008 it was still a trying season. When the Japanese manufacturer pulled the plug at the end of the year there was a feeling Rubens' time in F1 was up.

But, largely because of his experience, he was retained as the team became Brawn in 2009 and enjoyed the best car he'd been provided with in years. Okay, team-mate Jenson Button won the title whilst Rubens took just two wins and ended the year third, but he'd still enjoyed a rebirth. This allowed him to switch to Williams for 2010 where he assumed the position of team leader and comfortably beat rookie team-mate Nico Hulkenberg. For 2011 - his 19th in the sport - he takes on another rookie in the shape of Pastor Maldonado, and you have to feel he'll come out top again. Will he be be about for a 20th season? You wouldn't bet against it.