Vitaly Petrov

Vitaly Petrov, born in 1984, made history as the first Russian driver to compete in the Formula 1 World Championship, racing from 2010 to 2012 and accumulating 58 starts, 64 points, a podium finish and a fastest lap.

Petrov spent his first two seasons with Renault. He scored 27 points as a rookie in 2010, finishing thirteenth in the championship, and improved to tenth overall in 2011 with 37 points — the year that also brought his sole podium.

For 2012 he moved to Caterham, one of the newer teams at the back of the grid, where points proved out of reach; he was classified nineteenth in the standings.

His three-season career divides sharply between the competitive Renault years, in which he was a regular scorer, and a final campaign spent in machinery that could not challenge for the top ten. Petrov left the sport with a top-ten championship finish to his name from 2011.