Brendon Hartley will become just the ninth New Zealander to race in Formula One when he contests the United States Grand Prix for the Toro Rosso team on Monday (NZ time).
Brendon Hartley Photo: Supplied
So who is Hartley and how has he ascended to what is widely regarded as the pinnacle of race car driving?
Clay Wilson takes a closer look at the person set to be the first Kiwi in 33 years to line up on a Formula One grid.
EARLY YEARS
There was little doubt cars were going to play a primary role in Hartley's life.
Born in Palmerston North in 1989, he was raised in a motorsport-mad family with father Bryan and older brother Nelson both competitive drivers, while the family has also owned and operated Hartley Engines and Motorsport for more than 20 years.
Hartley was only six when his career began in kart racing and one year later he met another aspiring young driver named Earl Bamber, his current team-mate at Porsche and fellow pilot of the No 2 919 Hybrid which won the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans earlier this year.
Bamber's father would pay Hartley in "mince pies and sweet stuff" to help his son at the kart track, while in the years that followed the pair honed their driving skills on the Bamber family farm in Jerusalem near Whanganui.
By the age of 12, Hartley took part in his first full championship, finishing eighth in the 2002-03 Formula First single-seater season. A step up to the Formula Ford category the following season was followed by two seasons in the well-known Toyota Racing Series, finishing third and eighth overall before his first big break came.
Brendon Hartley, Timo Bernhard and Earl Bamber win 2017 Le Mans. Photo: PHOTOSPORT
VENTURING OFFSHORE
With some help from New Zealand motorsport legend Kenny Smith, then 16-year-old Hartley was placed on Red Bull Racing's radar in 2006. That led him to head for Europe, a bold move that soon paid dividends as he landed a junior contract with the team and duly won the European Formula Renault 2.0 crown the following year.
As he continued to display his skills in a variety of single-seater series, Hartley's first brush with Formula One arrived in 2008 when he completed a test for Red Bull. That call-up led to a promotion to the team's official reserve driver for 2009, while he also did two lots of testing for Toro Rosso, which functions as a sister team to Red Bull.
Hartley retained his reserve role for 2010 before a big bump in the road came in the middle of that year when the team unexpectedly cut him from their junior programme.
GETTING BACK ON TRACK
Disappointed but undeterred, Hartley forged on with his career in Europe, continuing to drive in the well-regarded Formula Renault 3.5 series and picking up a handful of drives in GP2, the official feeder series to Formula One. That persistence not only led to some testing for Mercedes in 2012, his last time on track with an F1 team, it also opened doors for a steady shift into sportscars and long-distance racing.
Hartley didn't need long to show he wasn't just an open-wheel specialist and as a few good results rolled in, Porsche sat up and started to take notice. By 2013, the powerful German manufacturer had seen enough and promptly signed the young Kiwi to be part of their full return to the World Endurance Championship the following year.
PROVING HIS CLASS
Evidencing his immense talents, Hartley soon proved the step up was well within his capabilities. Alongside former Australian Formula One driver Mark Webber and vastly experienced German driver Timo Bernhard in one of two Porsche entries in the flagship LMP1 class, he finished the 2014 season in ninth before everything fell into place in the following year.
With that experience on their side, the trio won four races on their way to the 2015 WEC drivers' championship, making Hartley a world champion at the age of just 26. A less memorable 2016 followed but joined by countryman and friend Bamber, Hartley and Bernhard have responded superbly this year to claim four wins from seven races, including taking out the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Mark Webber, Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley Photo: p
GOING FULL CIRCLE
A little more than a month after the high of his Le Mans victory, Hartley received the news that Porsche was to end its involvement in the LPM1 class at the end of 2017. While downbeat to learn he was set to lose a role he had relished, Hartley's resume meant he was unlikely to have trouble finding a new job.
Speculation soon surfaced he was in line to join IndyCar, reports linking him to a drive alongside countryman Scott Dixon at Chip Ganassi Racing in 2018. But, despite that level of interest, even the man himself didn't see it coming when he was called up last week to fill a vacant Formula One seat.
With the memories of being cut by the same team in 2010 still there, the opportunity to race in Texas was understandably one Hartley has been only too happy to grab with both hands.
"I never did give up on my ambition and childhood dream to reach F1," he said as the news was confirmed on Saturday.
"I have grown and learnt so much since the days when I was the Red Bull and Toro Rosso reserve driver, and the tough years I went through made me stronger and even more determined."