Nicolas Prost

Nicolas Prost Prost at the 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans Nationality French Born Nicolas Jean Prost (1981-08-18) 18 August 1981 Saint-Chamond, Loire, France Related to Alain Prost (father) FIA WEC career Debut season 2012 Current team Rebellion Racing Car no. 12 Starts 33 Wins 0 Poles 0 Fastest laps 0 Best finish 4th in 2012 Finished last season 10th Previous series 2015 2011–13 2011–12 2010 2009–11 2009–10, 2010–11 2008–09 2008 2006–07 2005 2005 2004–05 2004–05 2004 2003 Stock Car Brasil American Le Mans Series Andros Trophy FIA GT1 World Championship Le Mans Series Andros Trophy Électrique A1 Grand Prix Euroseries 3000 Spanish Formula Three Championship Formula Renault 3.5 Series Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 FFSA GT Championship Formula Renault 2000 France Formula Renault 2000 Germany Formula Campus France Championship titles 2009–10, 2010–11 2008 Andros Trophy Électrique Euroseries 3000 Formula E career Debut season 2014–15 Current team Renault e.dams Car no. 8 Starts 23 Wins 3 Poles 3 Fastest laps 2 Best finish 3rd in 2015–16 Finished last season 3rd 24 Hours of Le Mans career Participating years 2007, 2009 – Teams Team Oreca, Speedy Racing Team Sebah, Rebellion Racing Best finish 4th (2012, 2014) Class wins 1 (2014)

Nicolas Jean Prost (born 18 August 1981) is a French professional racing driver, son of 4-time Formula One champion Alain Prost, currently racing in the FIA Formula E Championship. He is also a longstanding racer in the FIA World Endurance Championship for Lotus Rebellion Racing. He also competes in the Andros Trophy and he was a reserve driver for Lotus F1.

Career

Early years

Born in Saint-Chamond, Loire, and despite being the oldest son of four-time Formula One World Drivers' champion Alain Prost and his wife Anne-Marie,^[1] he started his career at the late age of 22 in Formula Campus. Like his father, Prost was a golfer, winning tournaments when he was at Columbia University in New York.

Formula Three

In 2006, he joined Racing Engineering to contest in the Spanish Formula Three Championship. He won one race and had six podiums, which earned him 4th place in the championship as well as the best rookie title.

In 2007, he finished third in the Spanish Formula Three Championship with 2 wins, 1 pole and 7 podiums.

Euro Formula 3000

In 2008, he joined Bull racing and won the Euroseries 3000 championship in his first year with one win, two poles and seven podiums.^[1]

A1 Grand Prix

For A1 GP season 3 (2007–2008), Nicolas was the rookie driver for Team France.

For A1 GP season 4 (2008–2009), Nicolas was still the rookie driver and topped every single rookie sessions. He was promoted to racing driver for the end of the season and showed that he had the pace to fight on top. The team issued in a statement at the end of the seasons that he should be driving the entire 2009–2010 season.

Sports car racing

24 Hours of Le Mans

In 2007, he competed with Team Oreca in a Saleen S7-R with Laurent Groppi and Jean-Philippe Belloc and finished 5th in his category.

In 2009, he raced for the first time in the LMP1 category, with Speedy Racing Team Sebah. He drove a great race, especially on Sunday morning with a stunning quadruple stint which moved the car from 8th to 5th. Unfortunately, a gearbox problem later dropped the car to 14th.

After a difficult year in 2010, where he nonetheless drove the fastest lap of rebellion cars, he had a great race in 2011. Prost and his teammates Jani and Bleekemolen finished 6th and 1st in the unofficial petrol class.

In the 80th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2012, Prost and the Rebellion Racing Team got the fourth place in the LM-P1 class along with his co-drivers Neel Jani and Nick Heidfeld, their Lola B12/60 Coupe Toyota covered a total of 367 laps (3,108.123 miles), in the Circuit de la Sarthe. Prost drove the last stage of the competition.^[2]

Le Mans Series

In 2009, he participated in the European Le Mans Series for Speedy Racing Team Sebah alongside Marcel Fässler and Andrea Belicchi. The trio finished 5th in the championship. Since 2010 he is racing in the European Le Mans Series for Rebellion Racing alongside Swiss racing driver Neel Jani.

FIA World Endurance Championship

The Lola B12/60 that Prost drove in the 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans.

In 2012 and 2013, Prost competed in the FIA World Endurance Championship with Rebellion Racing in a LMP1-class Lola B12/60 Toyota. With his mate Neel Jani, they won 9 races in these two years in the LMP1 privateer category. He will race the new Rebellion R-One in the 2014 FIA World Endurance Championship season. Prost has won the first four races of 2014 in the LMP1-L Category and has already clinched the title in the category.

American Le Mans Series

Prost clinched back to back victories at Petit Le Mans in 2012 and 2013. He also finished 3rd in the Sebring 12 Hours in 2013.

Andros Trophy

During the 2009–2010 winter, Prost participated to the famous Andros Trophy ice racing series in the electrical car category. He clinched the championship with 5 poles, 6 wins, and 18 podiums out of 21 races. He successfully defended his title during the 2010–2011 winter.

In 2011–2012, he joined his dad in the works Dacia team and claimed the rookie title in the main series.

Formula One

Prost testing for Lotus in 2013.

In 2010, he drove a Renault F1 for the first time in Magny-Cours and impressed the team, beating his daily opponent by more than 2 seconds.

In 2011, he joined the gravity management structure and remained a driver for Lotus Renault F1. He drove some test sessions and straight line tests for the team, as well as some commercial roadshows.

In 2012, he remained a part of the Lotus Renault program and on 4 October 2012 it was announced that he would be testing with Lotus Renault Formula One during the young driver test at Abu Dhabi.^[3]

In 2013, he was still test and development driver for Lotus. He drove the rookie test in Silverstone where he posted the absolute fastest lap among the rookies and was only three tenths behind Vettel in the Red Bull.

For 2014, he remains test and development driver for Lotus.

Formula E

Prost racing in the 2014 Punta del Este ePrix

On 30 June 2014, Prost signed up for the inaugural FIA Formula E Championship with the team e.dams Renault.^[4] At the first race in Beijing, Prost became the first man to achieve a pole position in Formula E. He led the race until the last lap in the last corner where he was involved in a heavy crash with Nick Heidfeld. Prost turned seemingly deliberately into Heidfeld's car when he was being challenged into the last corner, lunging Heidfeld's car into a barrier. He later apologised for the incident.^[5] He was subsequently given a ten place grid penalty for the following race in Malaysia.^[6] In the second race in Putrajaya, Malaysia, he took pole position again but was given a ten place grid penalty carried from the previous race. He took his first win in Miami, despite a late challenge from Scott Speed. The result was enough for Prost to take the lead in the drivers' championship from Lucas di Grassi.

Racing record

Career summary

^* Season still in progress.
^† As Prost was a guest driver, he was ineligible for championship points.

Complete Spanish Formula 3 Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2007	Team Oreca	Laurent Groppi Jean-Philippe Belloc	Saleen S7-R	GT1	337	10th	5th
2009	Speedy Racing Team Sebah Automotive	Andrea Belicchi Neel Jani	Lola B08/60-Aston Martin	LMP1	342	14th	12th
2010	Rebellion Racing	Neel Jani Marco Andretti	Lola B10/60-Rebellion	LMP1	175	DNF	DNF
2011	Rebellion Racing	Neel Jani Jeroen Bleekemolen	Lola B10/60-Toyota	LMP1	338	6th	6th
2012	Rebellion Racing	Nick Heidfeld Neel Jani	Lola B12/60-Toyota	LMP1	367	4th	4th
2013	Rebellion Racing	Nick Heidfeld Neel Jani	Lola B12/60-Toyota	LMP1	275	39th	7th
2014	Rebellion Racing	Nick Heidfeld Mathias Beche	Rebellion R-One-Toyota	LMP1-L	360	4th	1st
2015	Rebellion Racing	Nick Heidfeld Mathias Beche	Rebellion R-One-AER	LMP1	330	23rd	10th
2016	Rebellion Racing	Nick Heidfeld Nelson Piquet Jr.	Rebellion R-One-AER	LMP1	330	29th	6th

Le Mans Series results

Intercontinental Le Mans Cup results

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results

Complete Formula E results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

^* Season still in progress. ^† Driver did not finish the race, but was classified as he completed over 90% of the race distance.

References

External links

• Official website
• Nicolas Prost career summary at DriverDB.com

Renault e.Dams
Founders	Jean-Paul Driot Alain Prost
Race drivers	8.  Nicolas Prost 9.  Sébastien Buemi
FIA Formula E cars	SRT 01E