Jann Mardenborough (born 9 September 1991) is a British professional racing driver. In 2011 he became the third and youngest winner of the GT Academy competition, beating 90,000 entrants to earn a professional racing contract with Nissan.[2] He had no previous motorsport experience, having played sim racing video games instead. During his career, he has finished on the podium in his class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, won races and contended for titles in GT3 and junior formula cars, and competed at the highest level in Super GT, Super Formula and the FIA World Endurance Championship.
Since 2016, Mardenborough has raced in Japan, including in the top-level Super GT and Super Formula championships. In 2016, he won a race and was a title contender in the lower GT300 class of Super GT, while also finishing runner-up in the Japanese Formula 3 Championship. In 2017, he moved up to the top GT500 class, where he would race until the end of 2020, scoring a single podium finish and contending for wins on multiple occasions. 2017 was his only season in Super Formula, where he took a pole position.
In 2015, Mardenborough was named as one of the 50 most marketable athletes in the world by Sports Pro Media. The 2023 film Gran Turismo is based on his career.
Mardenborough is portrayed by Archie Madekwe in the 2023 racing film Gran Turismo.[6] Mardenborough serves as a co-producer, stunt driver and consultant on the movie, which depicts his early career and personal life, and gave permission for the filmmakers to include his 2015 crash at the Nürburgring Nordschleife, which killed one spectator. He felt it "would have been a disservice for the audience for that not to be in there."[7]
Mardenborough became interested in cars at a young age, and he dreamed of becoming a professional racing driver from the age of five or six, having learnt that it could be a job. However, his family did not have the money required for him to start a career in motorsport, and he did not know anyone who could sponsor him, leading him to shelve the idea as he got older.[8] He began playing racing video games at the age of eight, when his friend had Gran Turismo on the original PlayStation. He visited his friend to play the game so often he was eventually given both the console and the game so that he could play it at home. After that, Mardenborough played the game almost constantly, and he continued to play subsequent Gran Turismo titles on the PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3, later with a force feedback steering wheel and pedals.[9][10][11]
In 2010, Mardenborough went to university to study motorsport engineering, but dropped out after three weeks as it was too maths-based for his liking.[12] During a gap year, he noticed an online time trial for the GT Academy competition on Gran Turismo 5 and decided to make a serious attempt at qualifying for the event, which offered a professional racing contract with Nissan to the overall winner.[13] After putting all his efforts into the time trial, which was contested by over 90,000 people, he managed to qualify in the top 20 in his region, which was required to progress to the next stages.[14] He then underwent training and a series of physical and racing challenges, eventually managing to get to the decisive final race, with all but three of his opponents having dropped out of contention. The final was a 20-minute race around the Silverstone National Circuit in real Nissan 370Z sports cars, and Mardenborough won by eight seconds to be crowned GT Academy winner and earn the professional Nissan contract. Before GT Academy, Mardenborough had never driven a high-performance car or been on a racetrack.[15][16]
Jann Mardenborough took part in the 2011 GT Academy competition[17], which was a joint venture between Nissan and the developers of "Gran Turismo" with the goal of identifying potential racers via online racing events. Mardenborough won the competition despite having no prior professional racing experience thanks to his outstanding talent.[18]
Following his GT Academy victory, Mardenborough went through a driver training programme and competed in several national races, enabling him to qualify for an international racing licence. He was then rewarded with a drive in a factory-backed Nissan 370Z GT4 at the Dubai 24 Hour race in January 2012.[19] Driving alongside fellow GT Academy winners Lucas Ordóñez, Jordan Tresson and Bryan Heitkotter, he finished third in his class and 26th overall.[3][20] During the rest of 2012, Mardenborough competed for RJN Motorsport in the British GT Championship with a Nissan GT-R GT3. Together with Alex Buncombe, he won a race at Brands Hatch and ended the season in sixth place in the GT3 championship. The pair had been on course to win the title in the final race until damper issues forced them outside the points.[21] He also took part in four rounds of the Blancpain Endurance Series.
Mardenborough driving for Arden International during the 2014 GP3 Series season
In 2013 Mardenborough switched to formula racing.[22] At the beginning of the year he contested the 2013 season of the Toyota Racing Series in New Zealand. He was the best-placed rookie and finished the season in tenth place in the championship.[23] After that he returned to Europe and secured a seat with Carlin Motorsport in the 2013 campaign of the FIA European Formula Three Championship,[24] as well as the British Formula 3 Championship.[25] He scored two podium results and finished sixth overall in the British series, while he was 21st out of 36 drivers in the European championship. In 2014, Mardenborough again competed in New Zealand's Toyota Racing Series at the start of the year, finishing second in the championship, only eight points behind the champion. He then joined Arden International to compete in the 2014 GP3 Series, the third-tier feeder series to Formula One, and was also signed by Red Bull Racing for a driver development programme.[26][27] He won his first GP3 race in Germany after starting from pole position and setting the fastest lap in the reversed-grid sprint race.[28][29] An additional podium and seven further points finishes during the season placed him ninth in the overall standings out of 36 competitors, ahead of his two teammates.
Mardenborough driving at the 2013 24 Hours of Le Mans, where he achieved a podium finish in the LMP2 class
Mardenborough made his debut at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2013, driving a Zytek Z11SN-Nissan for Greaves Motorsport alongside Lucas Ordóñez and Michael Krumm in the LMP2 class. Throughout a wet/dry race, the crew fought for a podium finish despite losing time due to untimely safety car periods, and ultimately achieved the feat by finishing third in class and ninth overall after a car ahead of them was disqualified post-race.[30][31][32][33][34] Later during the summer, he took part in the Spa 24 Hours in a Nissan GT-R GT3 together with Wolfgang Reip, Lucas Ordóñez and Peter Pyzera. This full GT Academy lineup claimed third position in the Pro-Am class and seventh overall.[35] Mardenborough returned to Le Mans in 2014 with OAK Racing, whose Ligier-Nissan LMP2 car he shared with Alex Brundle and Mark Shulzhitskiy. The trio led the LMP2 category for 14 hours and were in contention for the win until a spark plug issue with two hours remaining dropped them to fifth in class and ninth overall at the finish.[36]
In 2015, Mardenborough was selected as one of the drivers for Nissan Motorsports' entry into the top LMP1 class of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), which includes the 24 Hours of Le Mans. He also continued racing in GP3, switching to Carlin for the 2015 season.[38] Nissan entered the WEC with an unconventional front-engined car, named the GT-R LM Nismo. The team missed the first two races of the season while trying to improve the car, before making their debut at Le Mans.[39] The GT-R LM Nismo proved highly uncompetitive during the race and Mardenborough's No. 23 car broke down terminally with an hour remaining, but he was consistently the quickest of the three drivers in his car.[13][40] Nissan withdrew from the remainder of the season and eventually cancelled the programme at the end of the year.[41] In GP3, he claimed two podiums and scored points on six occasions to finish ninth overall ahead of future IndyCar champion Álex Palou.[42] He missed four races during the season as he took part in a round of the GP2 Series as a substitute for another driver at Carlin and had a testing commitment at the end of the year.[43][44]
On 28 March 2015, during a one-off outing in the VLN series, his GT3-class Nissan GT-R Nismo caught air at the Flugplatz section of the Nürburgring Nordschleife. It cartwheeled over the fence into spectators. One person was killed, while Mardenborough was not seriously injured.[45]
Mardenborough's achievements and growing global profile led to Sports Pro Media naming him 50th on their 2015 list of the 50 most marketable athletes in the world.[46]
Full-time career in Japan (2016–2020)
The Nissan GT-R GT3 in which Mardenborough took his first Super GT win in the GT300 class in 2016
In 2016, Mardenborough moved to Japan to compete in the GT300 class of Super GT and the Japanese Formula 3 Championship. In Super GT, driving a Nissan GT-R GT3 for NDDP Racing alongside co-driver Kazuki Hoshino, he scored a maiden win in the second round of the season, the Fuji 500km, and a further podium finish at Buriram saw the pair enter the season-ending double-header at Motegi just two points off the championship lead, although they ultimately finished fourth overall.[47][48][49][50] His Japanese F3 campaign with B-Max Racing saw him claim four wins and eight additional podiums to finish runner-up to future Super GT GT500 champion Kenta Yamashita by three points.[51] Mardenborough felt he had enough experience by then to fight for the prominent F3 title.[52]
For 2017, Mardenborough moved up to Super GT's top GT500 class with Nissan, joining the Calsonic-sponsored Impul team. His move to the GT500 class coincided with a downturn in form for Nissan, whose GT-R car often lagged behind its rivals from Honda and Toyota over the following years.[53] He and teammate Hironobu Yasuda finished 15th in the 2017 GT500 standings, with a best result of fifth, but they had been in contention for victory at the penultimate round at Buriram until a slow pit stop dropped them to third and then car problems with two laps to go forced them to retire.[54] Nissan also gave him permission to compete for the Toyota-powered Impul team in Super Formula, Japan's top-level single-seater series.[55] With three top-eight finishes in seven races, he finished 14th overall in his only season in the series. He took pole position for the second race of the season-ending Suzuka double-header, a race in which the grid was determined by the second fastest time of each driver in a damp, red flag-affected qualifying session, but both races were cancelled due to Typhoon Lan.[56][57]
Mardenborough remained at Impul for the 2018 Super GT season, now with Daiki Sasaki being his co-driver. After scoring three top-six finishes in the first four races, Mardenborough looked set to claim his first GT500 win at the Fuji 500 mile race, but a loose intercooler pipe while leading by 25 seconds forced the team out of the points.[58][59][60] At the following race at Sugo, Mardenborough broke through for his first podium finish in GT500. He had passed the Team KunimitsuHonda NSX-GT of Naoki Yamamoto and Jenson Button for the lead during the opening stint, but overheating issues caused by grass picked up in an off-track excursion by Sasaki limited the pair to third.[61][62] Scoring no points in the final two races, the duo finished 12th in the standings.
For 2019, Mardenborough was moved to the Kondo Racing team in Nissan's GT500 lineup, partnering Mitsunori Takaboshi.[63] Unlike Impul, who used the benchmark Bridgestone tyres, Kondo Racing ran the often uncompetitive Yokohama tyres. Despite this disadvantage, Mardenborough and Takaboshi finished just half a point behind the Impul crew in the championship, with five points finishes and a best result of fourth placing them 14th overall. In 2020, they finished 19th with just four points as both the new GT-R built for the updated GT500 regulations and the Yokohama rubber proved uncompetitive. Mardenborough had qualified fourth for round five at Fuji, but a gear selector problem in the race denied the team a potential podium finish.[64] Despite often being faster than his teammate, Mardenborough was not retained by Nissan for the 2021 season, making way for seven-time Formula 2/GP2 race winner and former Honda junior Nobuharu Matsushita.[65]
Activities after 2020
After leaving Nissan's GT500 lineup following the end of the 2020 season, Mardenborough was offered race seats in Super GT's GT300 class and Super Formula, but these required him to bring a budget, which he was unable to do.[53] In 2021 and 2022, he worked as a simulator and car development driver for Nissan e.dams and its customer team McLaren in Formula E. He also worked as a stunt driver and assisted in the production of the Gran Turismo film that is based on his career.[13] In May 2023, he made a return to racing at the Fuji 24 Hours round of the Super Taikyu Series, driving Helm Motorsports' Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3.[66] He and his crew scored pole position for the event and led significant portions of it, but ultimately finished fourth after encountering brake issues.[67] Mardenborough is set to contest the Silverstone 500 round of the 2024 British GT Championship with the McLaren 720S GT3 Evo of Team RJN.[68]
Satoshi Motoyama is a Japanese professional racing driver and team manager. He is best known for racing in the Super GT Series, formerly known as the All-Japan Grand Touring Car Championship (JGTC) as a factory driver for Nissan, and for racing in the Formula Nippon Championship. He is a three-time champion of the GT500 class of Super GT, and a four-time Formula Nippon/Super Formula champion, making him one of the most successful Japanese racing drivers of all-time.
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The Nismo Global Driver Exchange was an initiative from Nissan and Nismo to share driving experience from various motor racing categories around the world.
GT Academy was a television programme produced by Grand Central Entertainment and funded by Nissan and Sony Interactive Entertainment from 2008 to 2016. GT Academy provided skilled Gran Turismo players an opportunity to earn a real-life professional racing career with Nissan.
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