Vincenzo Sospiri
| Born |
7 October 1966 Forlì, Italy |
|---|---|
| Formula One World Championship career | |
| Nationality |
 Italian |
| Active years | 1997 |
| Teams | Lola |
| Entries | 1 (0 starts) |
| Championships | 0 |
| Wins | 0 |
| Podiums | 0 |
| Career points | 0 |
| Pole positions | 0 |
| Fastest laps | 0 |
| First entry | 1997 Australian Grand Prix |
| Last entry | 1997 Australian Grand Prix |
Vincenzo Sospiri (born 7 October 1966) is an Italian former racing driver.
In 1981, at the age of 15, Sospiri started racing in the Italian 100cc karting championship. In a karting career described by Michael Schumacher as 'dominating', Sospiri won several Italian and European karting championships and finished runner-up in several more, eventually winning the 100cc World Karting Championship in 1987.
In 1988 Sospiri progressed to Formula Ford, before working through to Formula 3000 in 1991, as team-mate to Damon Hill in the Middlebridge Lola T91/50 Cosworth. In an uncompetitive car, he was only capable of 9 points all season, including a second place at the German round of the championship at the Hockenheimring. He stepped back down into the Italian F3 series in 1992, before making a return to Formula 3000 in 1993, driving a Reynard 93D Judd for the Mythos team. He moved to the Super Nova team for 1994 and mounted a challenge for the championship despite not winning any races, eventually finishing fourth. He stayed at Super Nova for 1995 where he won three races and beat his team-mate Ricardo Rosset to the F3000 title.
He had tested for the Simtek Formula One team at Estoril in 1994, but was unable to raise enough funds to gain a race seat at the time. Despite winning the Formula 3000 title in 1995, very few options were available for Sospiri, so he chose to take the role of official Benetton test driver for the year.
Sospiri finally got his chance to race in Formula One with the MasterCard Lola project in 1997. Unfortunately it was clear from the first race, where both Sospiri and his former F3000 team mate Ricardo Rosset were more than 10 seconds off the pace and failed to qualify after being well outside the 107% rule, that the car was not capable of making the grid in a world championship race. Sospiri hoped to return to the grid in Brazil, but the team was withdrawn due to the massive debts incurred by its failing Formula One effort.
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