Sauber

Interesting facts

Peter Sauber launched his own independent Formula One team in 1993, backed by Mercedes and running rebadged Ilmor V10 engines. On the team's debut at the South African Grand Prix, JJ Lehto qualified sixth and finished fifth ahead of Gerhard Berger's Ferrari, scoring points straight away. After Karl Wendlinger's serious crash at Monaco in 1994, Sauber pioneered raised cockpit side protection, a safety feature that later became mandatory across the entire grid. In 1995, Red Bull acquired a significant stake in the team as part of a ten-year sponsorship agreement. From 1997, Sauber-Petronas Engineering supplied the team with customer Ferrari engines and gearboxes, helping it reach the podium in Hungary (1997) and Belgium (1998). In 2001, Sauber gave a race seat to the barely known Kimi Räikkönen, a decision even the FIA questioned given his thin racing résumé; he went on to become world champion with Ferrari in 2007. Sauber raced in Formula 1 from 1993 to 2025, across 24 seasons as a Swiss team. The team scored a total of 631 constructors' championship points. The team's best season was 2001, when it finished 4th in the Constructors' Championship with 21 points.