Guanyu Zhou

Zhou Guanyu (, pronounced ; born 30 May 1999) is a Chinese racing driver who currently competes in Formula One for Stake F1 Team Kick Sauber.

He is the first, and so far the only, Chinese driver to compete in Formula One.

Having started karting when he was eight years old in China, Zhou moved to Sheffield in 2012 for a more competitive racing environment.

In 2013 racing with the Sheffield-based Strawberry Racing team, he won both the Super 1 National Rotax Max Junior Championship and Rotax Max Euro Challenge.

For his final year of karting, Zhou finished 2nd in the Rotax Max Senior Euro Challenge and participated in selected rounds of WSK Champions Cup and the KF2 European Championship.

He also made his first and only appearance in the Karting World Championship, driving for Ricky Flynn Motorsport alongside Lando Norris and Jehan Daruvala.

After a successful season opener rounds in Paul Ricard and Hungaroring by finishing in 2 podium positions, Zhou struggled to find pace during the 2nd half of the season, finishing in 13th for his maiden season.

Zhou stayed for a second F3 season by rejoining Prema and improved to 8th in standings with 5 podium finishes.

Season highlights included leading race 3 in Spa and holding back Lando Norris in the penultimate round.

After speculation of a possible move to F2, Zhou remained with Prema for a third F3 season.

After a maiden career win in Pau, a podium in Hungaroring, and three consecutive podium finishes in Zandvoort, Zhou found him standing in 2nd, just a point behind teammate Marcus Armstrong.

Despite a strong qualifying pace in Spa and Silverstone, Zhou suffered 4 consecutive retirements with a series of teammate collisions and tyre punctures.

Zhou won his second F3 race in Hockenheim, finishing the season 8th in the standings, with 3 poles, and 2 wins.

Prior to that, he was a member of the Ferrari Driver Academy from 2014 to 2018, and served as the development driver for Formula E team DS Techeetah in 2018.

Zhou joined Prema Powerteam for the 2015 Italian F4 Championship.

After winning all three races in Round 2 at Monza and consistently finishing on the podium, Zhou ended the season as vice-champion and best rookie.

He also competed in selected rounds of the German ADAC F4 Championship, achieving two podium finishes in Spielberg and Spa.

Zhou joined team Motopark for the 2016 FIA European F3 Championship.

However, his car suffered electronic problems whilst leading the feature race, causing him to drop to 17th.

Later in the year, Zhou won his first Formula 2 race in Sochi, after Aitken and Ghiotto crashed at lap 5 of the sprint race, causing a premature end of the race.

Over the season, Zhou achieved 6 podiums and finished sixth in the championship.

Zhou entered his third F2 season staying with UNI-Virtuosi and partnering Felipe Drugovich.

He took pole position in the opening round at Bahrain and converted the pole to his first feature race win in F2.

The Chinese driver took another victory in the first sprint race in Monaco ahead of his team-mate Drugovich.

However, after another podium in Baku, Zhou went four races without scoring points, with a brake failure and a resulting collision with Dan Ticktum in the first lap of the second race in Azerbaijan and a spin in the first sprint race at Silverstone allowing fellow academy member Oscar Piastri to take the lead in the standings.

Zhou broke his duck by taking his third victory of the season in the feature race in Britain, beating out Ticktum for the victory.

At the following round in Monza Zhou was able to end up on the podium twice, losing out to Théo Pourchaire and Piastri in races one and three respectively.

Unfortunately for the Chinese driver, he stalled his car following a spin before the first race in Sochi and only managed to finish the feature race in sixth place, thus losing more ground to leader Piastri, who went into the penultimate round with a 36-point advantage.

In December 2018, Zhou joined UNI-Virtuosi Racing along with Luca Ghiotto for the 2019 FIA Formula 2 Championship.

Zhou achieved a maiden feature race podium in Barcelona after a strong qualifying and leading most of the race before dropping to third due to tyre degradation.

He subsequently achieved another 3rd in the Monaco sprint race by overtaking Artem Markelov at the start.

At Silverstone, Zhou scored his first Formula 2 pole position, becoming the first Chinese driver to do so.

Later, Zhou also scored third place in the sprint race at Paul Ricard.

In the feature race at Silverstone, he lost positions to his teammate and race winner Luca Ghiotto and the second-place driver Nicholas Latifi.

In Abu Dhabi, he also finished third with the fastest lap in Race 1.

He finished seventh in the championship and was subsequently awarded the Anthoine Hubert Award for being the highest-finishing rookie.

He competed in the FIA Formula 2 Championship for UNI-Virtuosi Racing from 2019 to 2021, having finished 3rd in the 2021 campaign.

A former member of the Alpine Academy, he served as the test driver for the Renault F1 Team and the Alpine F1 Team in 2020 and 2021 respectively.

Zhou remained at UNI-Virtuosi for the 2020 season, partnering Ferrari Driver Academy member Callum Ilott.

Zhou took his second Formula 2 pole position at the opening race at the Red Bull Ring.