Fernando Alonso

Fernando Alonso, born on 29 July 1981 in Oviedo, Spain, first sat in a kart at three, one his father had originally built for his older sister Lorena, who quickly lost interest in it. After three consecutive Spanish junior championships (1993-1995), he won the title on his car racing debut in the 1999 Euro Open by Nissan.

He made his Formula 1 debut for Minardi in 2001, and in 2003 became the youngest ever pole-sitter and race winner at Renault at the time. In 2005 and 2006 he won back-to-back titles as the first Spanish champion and the youngest world champion in history at the time, sparking the “Alonsomanía” phenomenon at home. Spells at McLaren, Renault again and Ferrari (2010-2014) followed, where he finished runner-up three times, including in 2012 after a remarkable comeback drive that fell just three points short, without ever landing the third title he craved.

After his first retirement from Formula 1 at the end of 2018, he moved into endurance racing and won the 24 Hours of Le Mans with Toyota in both 2018 and 2019, clinching the World Endurance Championship title in the 2018/19 super season, plus the 24 Hours of Daytona in 2019, making him to this day the only driver to have won both a Formula 1 and a WEC title. He returned to Formula 1 with Alpine in 2021, and moved to Aston Martin in 2023, where eight podiums in his first season and fourth in the championship marked a remarkable career resurgence.

In 2022 he set the record for the most Formula 1 starts, and in 2024 he became the first driver in history to start his 400th Grand Prix, at the Mexican Grand Prix. He has carried car number 14 since 1996, when at age 14, on 14 July, he won the karting world championship in a kart bearing that same number. Alonso has been a UNICEF ambassador since 2005 and, through his company A14 Management, manages the career of Gabriel Bortoleto, among others.