About Giedo

Like most racing drivers, Giedo began his career in karting. In 1998, a 13-year-old van der Garde won the Dutch championship to commence his climb up the motorsport ladder. Giedo competed in the rookie ‘superclass’ until 2001 although the pinnacle came in the shape of the World Championship crown in 2002.

For 2003, Giedo progressed to cars and Formula Renault with Dutch team Amersfoort Racing, achieving a final result of sixth place in his first season. The following year saw a move to the prestigious Formula 3 Euroseries, where an unfortunate series of car breakdowns resulted in lost race victories. At Germany’s Norisring he collected his only win of the year although, had technicalities not intervened, more wins could have brought a title with them.

The climb continued with a jump to Renault’s World Series in which Giedo’s second season became a demonstration at the front of the field; a double triumph in the season-opening races at Monza was a sign of things to come, with more wins picked up at Spa-Francorchamps, the Hungaroring and Le Mans before taking the title home from Portugal.

The Formula One teams had been keeping a watching brief, meantime, and Giedo successfully completed a deal to test for the Super Aguri team in 2006. Later in the year, Giedo would complete a test deal with home-grown Spyker before competing in the final two rounds of the 2008 Renault World Series as well as testing for the French marque’s F1 team at the end of the year.

Giedo’s GP2 mission began at the start of 2009; in a championship which is highly regarded as the final level before progressing to Formula One, he joined the 2007 Champion iSport team alongside Brazil’s Diego Nunes. In Hungary, Giedo clinched the team’s first win of the season and is the only Dutchman to have stood on the top step of a GP2 podium.