Raffaele Marciello

Raffaele "Lello" Marciello (born 17 December 1994) is a Swiss-born Italian professional racing driver who currently competes in the FIA World Endurance Championship and the GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup for BMW M Team WRT.

Marciello debuted in karting in 2005 and raced in various European championships, working his way up from the junior ranks to progress through to the KF2 category by 2010.

In 2010, Marciello graduated to single-seaters, racing in the newly launched Formula Abarth series in Italy for JD Motorsport.

He won opening race at Misano and race at Varano and amassed another two podiums it brought him third place in standings.

Also he and fellow Formula Abarth champion Brandon Maïsano became members of the Ferrari Driver Academy.

Marciello stepped up to Italian Formula Three Championship in 2011 and joined Prema Powerteam.

He claimed wins at Misano and Adria and another four podiums, finishing third and losing rookie title to Michael Lewis, but overcoming Maïsano by seven points.

In 2012 Marciello continued his collaboration with Prema Powerteam into Formula 3 Euro Series.

and the revived FIA European Formula Three Championship.

In FIA F3 he finished 2nd in the championship, with nine podiums including seven wins.

In Euro Series he finished 3rd with ten podiums and six wins.

In both championships he scored more wins than anybody else.

During the 2012 off-season Marciello competed in New Zealand-based Toyota Racing Series, taking ninth place in the championship with a win at Hampton Downs.

A former member of the Ferrari Driver Academy, he was the 2013 European Formula Three Champion, a reserve and test driver for the Sauber Formula One team in 2015, and spent three seasons competing in the GP2 Series.

He remained in F3 for 2013, and emerged as a pre-season favourite following his impressive results in the previous year and dominant performances in pre-season testing.

Marciello had been looking to be driving in the GP2 Series or World Series by Renault for 2014 after testing both cars in Catalunya in October 2013.

On 20 January 2014, the Ferrari Driver Academy announced Marciello would be racing in GP2 in 2014.

However, they did not confirm the team he would be competing with.

On 18 February, it was announced he would be driving for the Racing Engineering team.

Marciello achieved his first GP2 victory in the feature race at Spa-Francorchamps after an intense fight with McLaren junior driver Stoffel Vandoorne in the closing stages.

On 26 November 2014, Marciello made his Formula One debut behind the wheel of the Ferrari F14 T, during that day's post-season test at the Yas Marina Circuit.

He set the second fastest time of the session, half a second adrift of Pascal Wehrlein in the Mercedes F1 W05 Hybrid.

On 31 December 2014 it was announced that Marciello had signed as test and reserve driver for the Sauber Formula One team for 2015.

He joined Trident Racing for 2015, but struggled to capitalize on his 2015 debut, finishing seventh overall.

Marciello raced with Russian Time, replacing the Campos-bound Mitch Evans, in the 2016 season.

In January 2016, it was announced that Marciello had been dropped by Sauber and had split with the Ferrari Driver Academy for personal reasons.

He switched to GT racing in 2017 and became a works Mercedes-AMG driver ahead of the 2018 campaign, where he stayed until leaving in 2023 and subsequently signing with BMW.

In 2022, Marciello earned his first major endurance race victory by winning the Spa 24 Hours.

In 2017, Marciello ventured into the sportscar racing scene, driving a Mercedes-AMG GT3 for AKKA ASP in the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup and Blancpain GT Series Sprint Cup.

The Italian impressed in his debut year, scoring two podiums in the Sprint and Endurance cups respectively.

His highlight however came at the 24 Hours of Spa, where, having qualified on pole alongside teammates Edoardo Mortara and Michael Meadows, Marciello used up the maximum allowed driving time of 14 hours to help his team to finish third.

Ahead of the 2018 season, Mercedes-AMG added Marciello to their rank of Performance drivers, thus making him a fully-fledged factory driver.

The season saw him returning to both the Endurance Cup and Sprint Cup series where, once again with AKKA ASP, he paired up with Meadows in the latter and drove alongside Tristan Vautier and Daniel Juncadella in the former.

Marciello performed to a high level, taking second-placed finishes in the Endurance rounds at Silverstone and - after initially being awarded victory when a suspected technical non-compliance for the winning team caused them to be provisionally disqualified - Barcelona, which led him to a runner-up spot in the Endurance Cup.

Having inherited the title at first, an appeal by the disqualified team stripped the accolade from Marciello, with the disqualification being converted into a fine.

Meanwhile, wins at Budapest and the season finale at the Nürburgring alongside a slew of further podiums gave Marciello and Meadows the Sprint Cup title.

That year, Marciello also partook in all four rounds of the Intercontinental GT Challenge with Mercedes.

He scored podiums at Bathurst and Spa, as well as taking a win at the Suzuka 10 Hours, the latter earning him the provisional championship lead, though a seventh place at Laguna Seca, a race in which Marciello damaged his car and received a drive-through penalty after a mistimed move on the WRT Audi of Sheldon van der Linde, set him back to third in the standings.

Continuing into a third season of the Endurance and Sprint series at AKKA ASP, Marciello would be partnered by Vincent Abril in both championships, with the pair being joined by Michael Meadows for the endurance rounds.

In the Sprint Cup, Marciello was unable to defend his title, even if a win at Zandvoort and a pair of victories at the season finale in Hungary earned him and Abril third in the championship, one the pair battled for until the final race of the season.