Alex Lloyd (racing driver)

Infobox racing driver
name = Alex Stewart Lloyd


pixels =
caption =
nationality = GBR
date of birth = Birth date and age|1984|12|28
place of birth = Manchester, England
date of death =
retired =
related to =
current series = IndyCar Series
first year = 2006
current team = Chip Ganassi Racing
car number = 7
former teams = Sam Schmidt Motorsports [http://afsracing.com/ AFS Racing]
starts = 22
wins = 10
poles = 4
fastest laps =
best finish = 1st
year = 2007
prev series = Euro Formula 3000
Formula Renault
prev series years = 2004
2002-2003
titles = Indy Pro Series champion
title years = 2007
awards = McLaren Autosport BRDC Award
award years = 2003

Alex Stewart Lloyd (born 28 December 1984 in Manchester, England) is a Manx motor racing driver. He currently takes part in the IndyCar Series.

Early career

At the age of nine Lloyd began driving in karts in the British Super One Championship also driving in the European championship. He became British Open Champion in the category in 1999. In 2000, he began testing Formula Ford cars.

In 2001, he moved into Formula Ford racing achieving a 2nd place at a European Championship round at Spa-Francorchamps. He also finished in 13th place in the highly prestigious Formula Ford Festival. Over the winter he raced in the Formula Renault UK Winter Series reaching 3rd place in the championship. He graduated to the main Formula Renault series in 2002 finishing 9th in the championship.

During 2003 Lloyd received wider recognition for his ability earning the BRCD McLaren Autosport Young Driver of the Year award. This was after finishing 2nd in the Formula Renault UK championship to Lewis Hamilton, after recording 2 wins.

Racing around the world

In 2004 Lloyd conducted his first Formula One test in a McLaren as part of his prize for winning the award the previous year. He also took part in the final seven rounds of the European Formula 3000 series recording one win and three pole positions.

During 2005 Lloyd had a limited racing program, taking in 2 races in Italian Formula 3000 for the GP Racing in order to help with car development and a one-off ride in a World Series by Renault event at Monaco. For the winter of 2005–06 he was signed up to drive in A1 Grand Prix for Team Great Britain, however he only ever undertook limited testing and was never to able race the car, with Darren Manning drafted in for the one event that driver Robbie Kerr was unavailable.

For the 2006 season, he signed with AFS Racing part way through the year to race the remainder of the whole season in the Indy Pro Series—his parents sold their house in Port Soderick in the Isle of Man to facilitate this, and the gamble paid off. He qualified second for his first race with the team at St. Petersburg and finished his second race that weekend in third place. In July, he won the road course race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway the day before the United States Grand Prix. Later in the season he won the Valley of the Moon 100 held at Infineon Raceway and went on to finish seventh in the final standings.

For the 2007 IPS season, he drove for Sam Schmidt Motorsports and promptly won the first five races in the season. He clinched the series championship with his eighth win of the season at Infineon Raceway with two races remaining in the season. During the season he shattered all league records for consecutive wins (5), wins in a season (8), career wins (10) and most points scored (652). He is the only person ever to have won on both the road course at Indianapolis Motor Speedway and also the famous two and a half mile oval itself. He also set a record of qualifying on the front row for every race where qualifying took place.

On October 17, 2007, Lloyd was signed as a driver in Chip Ganassi Racing's driver development program. In 2008 he participated in a limited schedule that includes IndyCar Series and Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series Daytona Prototype races and limited Indycar testing.

On April 10, 2008, it was announced that Chip Ganassi Racing and Rahal Letterman Racing would work together to field an entry for Alex, for the 2008 Indianapolis 500 on May 25, 2008. Lloyd was fastest in the rookie tests, but only qualified in 19th place, after having been briefly hospitalized following a heavy accident at convert|223|mph|abbr=on. Towards the end of the race he crashed heavily, sliding down the pit road and across several teams' pit bays, all of which were empty.

In 2009, it was announced that Chip Ganassi Racing had re-signed Alex in the hope of running him for the full 2009 season in Indycar alongside its two signed drivers Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti, both Indy500 Champions and both Indycar Series Champions..

External links

* [http://www.indycar.com/pro/stats/driver_stats.php?driver_id=304&statYear=2008&showCareer=14 Alex Lloyd page on official IPS series site]
* [http://www.alex-lloyd.com Alex Lloyd official site]