Anthony Davidson
Anthony Denis Davidson (born 18 April 1979 in Hemel Hempstead, England) is a British racing driver best known for his appearances in Formula One and various endurance series.
Career
2001-2003: BAR Test Driver
After finishing runner up in the 2000 British Formula Ford championship, Davidson was offered a position in BAR's testing lineup for 2001, alongside fellow British rising stars Marc Hynes and Justin Wilson. These duties were dovetailed in 2001 with a British Formula 3 programme, in which Davidson finished second to Carlin teammate Takuma Sato, in what was a very close fight for the championship.
Davidson continued as BAR test driver for the next two years, while also being promoted to a reserve driver status following the promotion of Wilson into a race seat for 2002.
2004-2006: BAR/Honda
Due to BAR's lack of performance in 2003, following on from a disappointing 2002, Justin Wilson decided to leave the team after the British Grand Prix, handing Davidson his race debut at the following round, the European Grand Prix. While Davidson was immediately on the pace, out-qualifying his more experienced teammate Pedro de la Rosa consistently, reliability problems with the 005 chassis meant that he failed to finish his first three races, and to make matters worse, his fourth, the Italian GP, was boycotted by all the Michelin-shod teams, including BAR. Davidson would hence score his first points in Belgium with seventh place, and then followed that up with a season best fourth place at the US Grand Prix two rounds later, to end the season with seven points, the highest points tally of BAR's four drivers that year.
For 2004, Davidson would be retained by the team, and was be joined by former Jordan driver and Formula 3 rival Takuma Sato, who had replaced de la Rosa at the previous year's Japanese GP. Davidson continued his good points scoring record, albeit being outperformed by Sato - however he did take a first ever podium at the season-ending Japanese Grand Prix with a second place ahead of his teammate on home soil.
Davidson and Sato continued for another season in 2005, however the team were not as strong as they were the year before. Davidson finished the season in sixteenth place.
Honda upped their stake in the team in 2006, bringing in defending champion Fernando Alonso - meaning Davidson made way and spent the season as reserve driver instead.
2007: Super Aguri
Davidson was loaned to Honda customer team Super Aguri for 2007 and once again acted as their reserve driver.
Complete Formula One Grand Prix results
| Year | Entrant | Chassis | Engine | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | WDC | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2003 | Lucky Strike BAR Honda | BAR 005 | Honda RA003E 3.0 V10 | AUS TD |
MAL TD |
SMR TD |
ESP | AUT TD |
MON TD |
CAN TD |
GBR | EUR Ret |
GER Ret |
HUN Ret |
ITA DNA |
BEL 7 |
BRA 9 |
USA 4 |
JPN Ret |
16th | 7 | ||||
| 2004 | Lucky Strike BAR Honda | BAR 006 | Honda RA004E 3.0 V10 | AUS 5 |
MAL 4 |
BHR 8 |
MON Ret |
CAN Ret |
USA 8 |
CHN 10 |
BRA 11 |
ARG Ret |
KOR C |
JPN 2 |
7th | 19 | |||||||||
| 2005 | Lucky Strike BAR Honda | BAR 007 | Honda RA005E 3.0 V10 | AUS 13 |
MAL 8 |
BHR 11 |
SMR DSQ |
ESP EX |
MON EX |
EUR 10 |
CAN 6 |
USA DNS |
FRA Ret |
GBR Ret |
GER Ret |
HUN 8 |
TUR 11 |
ITA 12 |
BEL 10 |
BRA 8 |
URU 9 |
JPN 7 |
CHN Ret |
16th | 8 |