Paul di Resta

Paul di Resta (born 16 April 1986) is a British racing driver from Scotland, competing in the FIA World Endurance Championship for Peugeot Sport in their LMH entry.

He drove in Formula One for Force India from to, and became a reserve driver for the Williams F1 team in , driving a single race for them as a substitute driver in.

The award had been won by his cousin Dario Franchitti in 1992.

He started his career in karting, racing in various competitive series of karts from 1994 until 2002.

In 2001 he won the British JICA Championship.

He stepped up to single-seaters at the end of 2002, when he competed in the British Formula Renault Winter Series.

He raced in British Formula Renault full-time in 2003 with the Eurotek Motorsport team, finishing seventh in the standings with one race win.

He switched to Manor Motorsport for 2004, finishing third in the championship standings with four wins.

He also entered some races of Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 with the Manor team.

He also won the McLaren Autosport BRDC Young Driver of The Year Award in 2004.

Di Resta switched to the Formula Three Euroseries with Manor Motorsport in 2005, finishing tenth in the standings.

For 2006 he moved to the ASM Formule 3 team, winning the championship with five wins, beating teammate and future Formula One World Drivers' Champion, Sebastian Vettel.

Di Resta also won the 2006 BP Ultimate Masters at Circuit Park Zandvoort.

In 2007, di Resta switched from single-seaters to race in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM) touring car racing series, for Mercedes.

In the championship, he finished 5th overall behind drivers Mattias Ekström (who won his second DTM title), Bruno Spengler, Martin Tomczyk and Jamie Green.

Di Resta was the highest driver in the standings to drive a non-2007 car.

His performances earned him a 2008 Mercedes C Klasse for the 2008 season, in which he won two races and finished second in the points, four points behind eventual champion Timo Scheider of Audi.

In 2009, he finished third overall behind Scheider and compatriot Gary Paffett.

Di Resta tested for the McLaren Formula One team, and was in the frame for a drive with the Force India team for the 2009 season due to the teams' shared engine supplier, Mercedes-Benz.

However, Force India chose to retain Giancarlo Fisichella and Adrian Sutil, with Vitantonio Liuzzi as reserve driver.

In December 2009, with Fisichella having moved to Ferrari and Liuzzi being promoted to the race team, di Resta took part in a test with the team at the Jerez circuit alongside J. R. Hildebrand.

In 2010, he won three races in a row on the way to winning the championship.

At the Autosport International show in January 2010, he was said to be close to a deal as the team's test and reserve driver for the 2010 season.

The deal was announced on 2 February.

Di Resta made his Formula One race meeting début at the 2010 Australian Grand Prix, where he took part in the first free practice session in place of Sutil and finished 11th.

He drove in the first practice session of all the following races until the Monaco Grand Prix where he did not take part.

He resumed driving for the team at the European Grand Prix and the following British Grand Prix.

After sitting out the German Grand Prix he returned for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Di Resta subsequently sat out the Belgian Grand Prix as Tonio Liuzzi and Adrian Sutil needed as much track-time as possible to get the feeling of the new parts.

He participated in practice for the Italian Grand Prix, but did not participate in the Singapore or Japanese Grands Prix.

The team elected that di Resta should miss the Korean Grand Prix to allow Liuzzi and Sutil to get used to the new track for the race.

Di Resta joined Adrian Sutil in the Force India Formula One racing team for the season, replacing Vitantonio Liuzzi.

A former Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM) and Formula 3 Euro Series champion, di Resta did not secure a Formula One seat for 2014, instead rejoining Mercedes to race again in DTM.

He later became a reserve F1 driver for McLaren for the 2022 season, and a former commentator for Sky Sports' coverage of F1.

Di Resta is of Italian descent and was born in Uphall, Scotland, and grew up in Bathgate, West Lothian.

He is a former pupil of Bathgate Academy and supports Celtic Football Club.

He now lives in Monaco, and is a cousin of racing drivers Dario and Marino Franchitti.

His step-father was Scottish footballer Dougie McCracken.

His younger brother, Stefan, has raced at an amateur level and his half-brother, Jon, is a goalkeeper for the Norwich City u23's.

Di Resta and Laura Jordan became engaged in December 2013 and married on 28 August 2014.