Takuma Sato

Takuma Sato (佐藤 琢磨), nicknamed "Taku", is a Japanese professional racing driver.

He competes part-time in the IndyCar Series, driving the No. 75 Honda for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.

Sato's aggressive driving style paid dividends at the, where, after the team did not pit under safety car conditions, Sato fought back with some daring overtaking moves to score his first podium finish and the first for a Japanese driver since Aguri Suzuki at the 1990 Japanese Grand Prix.

Reliability issues caused him to retire six times, but he scored points in nine of the 11 races he completed to finish eighth in the championship with 34 points, the best-ever result for a Japanese driver in Formula One.

His efforts helped BAR-Honda to finish second in the Constructors' Championship.

After winning the national karting title in 1997, he moved to Europe with backing from Honda.

He briefly raced in Vauxhall Junior and Formula Opel, before debuting in Class B of the British Formula 3 Championship mid-way through 1999 British Formula Three Championship with class wins at the British Grand Prix and Spa for Diamond Racing.

He moved to the top class of the championship with Carlin Motorsport in 2000, taking four wins and third place in the championship.

In 2001, he won 12 out of 26 races to take a dominant championship win, the first for a Japanese driver in the series.

In 2001 he also won the prestigious Macau Grand Prix and Masters of Formula 3 non-championship F3 races.

In Sato graduated to Formula One with the Honda-powered Jordan team, and was paired with Giancarlo Fisichella.

His low point was a tremendous crash in Austria, caused when Nick Heidfeld lost control of his Sauber under braking and hit the side of Sato's car, punching a hole in the side of the cockpit.

Throughout he showed flashes of speed but also wild driving, nevertheless the team's faith in Sato was repaid by a fine drive to fifth at his home Grand Prix in Suzuka.

With Honda's focus shifting solely to British American Racing for, Sato joined the Brackley-based outfit as a test driver.

For the final round in Japan, Sato replaced Jacques Villeneuve and scored the second points finish of his career with sixth place, after a battle with Michael Schumacher.

He competed in Formula One from 2002 to 2008 for the Honda-powered Jordan, BAR and Super Aguri teams, scoring 44 points overall, and a single podium which was at the 2004 United States Grand Prix.

The new outfit was in effect a Honda B-team but ran the first half of the season with a modified version of a 2002 Arrows A23 chassis.

Nevertheless, Sato's reputation improved thanks to his professional attitude and competitive spirit.

The team introduced a new car, the SA06 at the and by the end of the season, Sato was outpacing the Midland cars.

At the season finale in Brazil Sato finished tenth just two places short of a points finish and comfortably ahead of both Toro Rossos and the Spyker MF1s.

His 8th-place finish in the 2004 Formula One World Drivers' Championship was the best-ever result for a Japanese driver in the series until 2021.

Sato has become known among fans and media for his motto "no attack, no chance" with regards to his racing style.

Born in Tokyo, Sato began karting in Japan at the age of 19.

He was signed to race full-time in 2004.

During the 2004 season, Sato qualified four times in the top-three, including a front row start and an overall lap record at the European Grand Prix.

Sato was retained by BAR-Honda for the 2005 season, but the 2005 car was not as close to the front of the pack as the previous year's design.

Sato missed the with illness, and both drivers were disqualified from the and the entire team banned from the two subsequent races for using cars that were underweight when all fuel was removed.

The Court did not find that this was deliberate.

Sato's season never recovered from that point, and he ended the season with eighth-place at the Hungarian Grand Prix as his only points finish, despite qualifying seven times in the top ten.

Sato was not re-signed for 2006, despite Honda taking full control of the team.

Sato joined the new Super Aguri F1 team for, run by Japanese former driver Aguri Suzuki.

For 2007, Super Aguri ran a reworked version of the previous year's Honda RA106 chassis.

Their performance improved drastically as Sato made it through to Q3 at the.

He then scored the first point for the team at the.

At the, Sato finished sixth after having a race that had seen him move from the middle of the grid to a high of fifth, passing Ferrari's Kimi Räikkönen before a pit-stop error dropped him back to eleventh.

He moved up five places in the last 15 laps, passing Toyota's Ralf Schumacher and then on lap 67 the McLaren-Mercedes of Fernando Alonso; the latter pass was met with cheers around the track and received him the "Overtake of the Year" award from F1 Racing magazine.

Sato raced full-time in the IndyCar Series from 2010 until 2022 for KV Racing Technology, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, A. J. Foyt Enterprises, Andretti Autosport, and Dale Coyne Racing, all with Honda engines.

Before winning the Indianapolis 500, Sato became the first Japanese-born driver to win an IndyCar Series race when he won the 2013 Grand Prix of Long Beach.

Sato is a two-time winner of the Indianapolis 500, having won the event in 2017 and 2020.

He was the first Asian driver to win the Indianapolis 500, and the twentieth driver to win the race more than once.