By Steph Farnsworth and Jack Sargeant
Jump to section: The beginnings | HRT | Renault
Beginnings
Bruno began in karts at the age of five. But when he was eleven his uncle Ayrton was killed behind the wheel of his Formula One car the Senna family halted Bruno’s racing career. It wasn’t until almost a decade later, at the age of 21, that Bruno’s racing ambitions were clear to his family. A year later in 2004 Senna made his first race start in the British Formula BMW Championship and scored a best result of 6th.
2005 saw Senna move to the British Formula Three International Series where he drove for Raikkonen Robertson Racing. In his rookie year he ended the season tenth with several podium finishes but without a race win. 2006 saw a marked improvement with Senna winning the first two races of the series. In total he collected five victories and finished 3rd in the standings.
The shift to GP2 in 2006 meant his dream of reaching F1 was becoming more and more realistic. Racing for Arden International in 2007, Senna showed he had the pace but at time struggled and had his fair share of car troubles, but he managed a win at Spain.
The next year Senna was to switch teams to iSport International (he also drove for them in the Asia series). He would finish the year 2nd in the standings and would achieve two victories.
An opportunity of an F1 race seat arose in 2009 (possibly at the new Brawn GP team) but when this did not materialise Senna was left looking for a drive to keep him busy until he could have a chance at poaching an F1 cockpit again.mHe joined Oreca Le Mans team and would finish 3rd.
HRT
Bruno Senna, HRT, Yas Marina, 2010 - Photo © HRT
Senna gained an F1 test in 2008 with Honda, this at least gave him some experience (he came within three tenths of Button’s time) even if he could not secure a drive with the team. When Honda pulled out of the sport the new team owner Ross Brawn decided to go with experience in Barrichello than take a gamble on young Bruno.
After working hard during the 2009 season to secure a drive Senna was announced as a driver for new team Campos (later HRT). Unfortunately for him, it was a car which is likely going to go down in F1 folklore as one of the worst ever, and he retired from six of the first eight races. He finished the season with a highest finish of 14th, 23rd in the championship after failing to score a single championship point.
Renault
For 2011, Senna was left without a race seat after Hispania elected to go with Tonio Liuzzi and Narain Karthikeyan, and he had to settle for a role as reserve driver at Renault. He had initially hoped to take the place of injured driver Robert Kubica, but the team elected to go with the more experienced Nick Heidfeld to partner Vitaly Petrov rather than Senna.
Nevertheless, Senna got his chance when Heidfeld was dropped prior to the Belgian Grand Prix after a string of below-par performances, and scored his first ever championship points on his second race for the team at Monza.
