Mark Webber (racing driver)

Mark Alan Webber (born 27 August 1976) is an Australian former racing driver, broadcaster, and driver manager who competed in Formula One from 2002 to 2013. Webber won nine Formula One Grands Prix across twelve seasons. In endurance racing, Webber won the FIA World Endurance Championship in 2015 with Porsche.

Webber began karting at age twelve or thirteen and achieved early success, winning regional championships before progressing to car racing in the Australian Formula Ford Championship and the British Formula 3 Championship. He competed for two years opposite Bernd Schneider in the FIA GT Championship with the AMG Mercedes team, finishing runner-up in the 1998 season with five wins in ten races before finishing second in the 2001 International Formula 3000 Championship driving for Super Nova Racing. Webber made his F1 debut with the Minardi team in the 2002 season and finished fifth in his first race, the Australian Grand Prix. He moved to the Jaguar squad for the 2003 and 2004 championships. For the 2005 season, he was granted an early release from his contract with Jaguar and joined the Williams team, securing his first podium finish at the Monaco Grand Prix. Webber remained at Williams until 2006, driving for the Red Bull team for the rest of his F1 career. He won nine F1 Grands Prix, thirteen pole positions and finished third in the World Drivers' Championship in the 2010, 2011 and 2013 seasons.

Webber left Formula One after 2013 and moved to the World Endurance Championship, sharing a Porsche 919 Hybrid with Bernhard and Hartley in the fully-professional Le Mans Prototype 1 class from the 2014 to 2016 seasons. The trio won eight races in the final two seasons and the 2015 World Endurance Drivers' Championship. He retired from motor sport in 2016, becoming a television pundit for Britain's Channel 4 and Australia's Network 10 and a driver manager. Webber received the Australian Sports Medal in 2000 and was appointed Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in the 2017 Australia Day Honours. Webber is an inductee of both the Australian Motor Sport Hall of Fame and the FIA Hall of Fame.

On 27 August 1976, Webber was born to middle-class parents, motorcycle dealer and petrol station owner Alan Webber and his wife Diane, in the small New South Wales town of Queanbeyan located in the Tablelands, on the Queanbeyan River banks, near Canberra. His paternal grandfather was a firewood merchant. Webber has an elder sister, Leanne. He was educated at the nearby Isabella Street Primary School and Karabar High School (KHS). Webber represented KHS in athletics and rugby league and did Australian rules football, cricket and swimming after his mother encouraged him to get involved in as many sports as possible. At the age of thirteen, he was a ball boy for the rugby league team Canberra Raiders for a year and earned money delivering pizzas in the Canberra and Queanbeyan areas in his late schooling years. Webber also worked as an apprentice plumber and woodcutter.

Webber lives in the UK, in the small Buckinghamshire village Aston Clinton with his wife Ann Neal, his former manager, and is stepfather to her son from a previous relationship. Webber is a supporter of Sunderland A.F.C..

Webber began driving motorbikes on weekends from about age four or five on his maternal grandfather's 2,500-acre (1,000 ha) farm. Webber was not encouraged to seriously take up motorcycling by his father, because he sponsored some local children who were injured in motorbike accidents. At about twelve or thirteen, he switched to karting, buying a go-kart from a school friend's father. He developed himself at a local indoor go-kart centre near his home. Webber received a second-hand worn out go-kart from his father in 1990 and drove it about once a month at the Canberra Go-Kart Club and in meetings in and around Canberra. Andy Lawson, owner of Queanbeyan Kart Centre, built karts around Webber's frame and Webber's father leased his petrol station and worked long hours at a car dealer to fund his son's karting activities. Webber opted for karting, and made his junior-level karting debut in 1991 aged 14, winning the 1992 Australian Capital Territory and New South Wales (NSW) State championships. In 1993, Webber won the Canberra Cup, the King of Karting Clubman Light Class titles, the 1993 Top Gun Award at the Ian Luff Advanced Driving School, and the 1993 NSW Junior National Heavy Championship in a Lawson kart with a larger, more powerful engine.

In 1994, Webber made his car racing debut, competing in the eight-round Australian Formula Ford Championship featuring non-aerodynamically dependent open-wheel racing vehicles fitted with treaded tyres. He drove Craig Lowndes' championship-winning 1993 RF93 Van Diemen FF1600 car that his father purchased. Webber achieved a season-high third at Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit for 14th in the Drivers' Championship with 30 points and second in the Rookie of the Year standings. He was disqualified from the non-championship Australian Grand Prix Formula Ford support race for passing the field on the formation lap. In late 1994, Webber's father asked English-born media officer Ann Neal to locate sponsorship for Webber; Neal located support from the Australian Yellow Pages after she and Webber reviewed six proposals. Webber moved to Sydney from Queanbeyan to be closer to Australia's motor racing industry. When not racing, he earned money working part-time as a driving instructor at Oran Park Raceway defensive driving school.

Webber entered the 1995 Australian Formula Ford Championship with Yellow Pages Racing driving a 1995 Van Diemen car, finishing fourth overall with three victories, three pole positions and 158 points in a high-quality field. Webber finished second at both Mallala Motor Sport Park rounds of the 1995 Australian Drivers' Championship driving a Birrana Racing Reynard 90D-Holden car for seventh in the Drivers' Championship with 32 points. In October 1995, he moved to the London suburb of Hainault, to further his racing career. He entered the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch with the Van Diemen factory team, and finished the race third. The result impressed team owner Ralph Firman Sr. enough to sign Webber to Van Diemen for both the 1996 European Formula Ford Championship and the 1996 British Formula Ford Championship, finishing third and second overall, respectively. He won four races in the British series, finishing second in the championship behind teammate Kristian Kolby, and was also third in the Formula Ford Euro Cup driving two of the three rounds with a win at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps. Webber won the Formula Holden Australian Grand Prix support race, and the Formula Ford Festival.