Robert Shwartzman

**Robert Mikhailovich Shwartzman** (born 16 September 1999), is a Russian racing driver competing in the FIA Formula 2 Championship. He is a former member of the Ferrari Driver Academy. He is the 2018 Toyota Racing Series champion and the 2019 FIA Formula 3 champion.

## Career

### Karting

Born in Israel and raised in St. Petersburg, Shwartzman began karting in 2004 at the age of five. Throughout a seven-year career of karting professionally, he claimed karting titles across Europe (predominantly in Italy).

### Formula 4

In 2014, Shwartzman graduated to single-seaters, partaking in six races of the Italian F4 Championship with Cram Motorsport, finishing sixteenth overall.

The following year, Shwartzman partook in the championship full-time with Mücke Motorsport, claiming two wins and finishing third in the standings behind the Prema Powerteam duo of Ralf Aron and Guanyu Zhou. He also partook in the inaugural ADAC Formula 4 championship, finishing fourth in the standings.

### Formula Renault

In 2016, Shwartzman moved to Formula Renault 2.0 with reigning series champions Josef Kaufmann Racing after testing with the team at Motorland Aragon. He claimed two victories in the Northern European Cup and finished sixth in the standings. In the Eurocup, Shwartzman finished eighth.

For 2017, Shwartzman stayed in Formula Renault 2.0, but decided to switch to the R-ace GP team. He lost thirteen points to his teammate Will Palmer and finished in the third place in the driver standings, but was able to win six races, having podium finish at all rounds excepting Red Bull Ring, and at Circuit Paul Ricard.

### GP3 Series

In November 2016, Shwartzman was listed among the drivers partaking in the post-season test at Yas Marina with Koiranen GP.

### Toyota Racing Series

Shwartzman made his Toyota Racing Series debut during the 2018 off-season, competing for M2 Competition. He finished all fifteen races in the top-five and was the only driver in the season to do so. He won the Denny Hulme Memorial Trophy and the series title, ahead of the M2 teammates Richard Verschoor and Marcus Armstrong, who have raced in the series in 2017.

### FIA Formula 3 European Championship

In September 2017, Shwartzman tested the European Formula 3 machinery with Prema Powerteam. After his tests with Prema he was included into the Ferrari Driver Academy. In December 2017, it was confirmed that he will race for Prema in 2018 FIA Formula 3 European Championship. Shwartzman took his first European Formula 3 win in the third Spielberg race. With his second win in the season finale he outscored another Ferrari Driver Academy member Marcus Armstrong in the drivers' standings, completing the top-three with claiming the rookie title.

### FIA Formula 3 Championship

Following the merger of the FIA Formula 3 European Championship and GP3 Series into the new FIA Formula 3 Championship in 2019, Prema announced Shwartzman as one of its drivers for the inaugural season. Shwartzman qualified on pole for the first Barcelona race and initially finished the race in second before being promoted to race winner following a time penalty to Christian Lundgaard. In the following day's race, he finished fourth.

He took third place at qualifying in Circuit Paul Ricard and finished second in the first race, losing only to his team-mate Jehan Daruvala. After starting from seventh in the grid, at the sprint race, he took his second victory. At the Red Bull Ring Shwartzman qualified only 12th, after suffering from technical issues. He went up to fifth in the first race, and in the next race he battled with Marcus Armstrong, but at the final lap made contact. Armstrong retired and Shwartzman crossed the finish line in first, but was given a five-second time penalty for causing a collision, dropping him down to third behind race winner HWA Racelab driver Jake Hughes, who took victory here last year, and Jehan Daruvala.

At Silverstone, Shwartzman qualified sixth. It looked like he would finish in the same position, but with 3 laps remaining he overtook Christian Lundgaard. Later, Pedro Piquet also overtook him. On Sunday, he finished second with the fastest lap, behind Hitech Grand Prix and race winner Leonardo Pulcini who took two victories in the 2018 GP3 Series – at Sochi and Abu Dhabi – all victories for the Italian were at the feature races. At the Hungaroring, it was the first weekend for the Russian driver to not score any podiums - he qualified fourth, but following a poor start, finished only in fifth. The following day, he was set to take third position, however retired following difficulties in tyre management and a collision with Felipe Drugovich. At Spa-Francorchamps Shwartzman qualified in fourth position, and overtook Jehan Daruvala and Marcus Armstrong to finish in second place. In the following sprint race, he finished third behind Yuki Tsunoda, and Marcus Armstrong.

At Monza, he qualified third, and despite a five-place grid penalty, was able to win his third race of the year. In the sprint, he took eight place by a margin of 0.067 seconds over Christian Lundgaard and to take the final point. Shwartzman took the pole position ahead of his home race at Sochi, but he couldn't save his race lead and finished second behind Armstrong. However, Shwartzman's point advantage on Daruvala was enough for him to clinch the championship title.

### FIA Formula 2 Championship

Shwartzman joined Prema Racing for the 2020 FIA Formula 2 Championship, partnering Mick Schumacher. The season was planned to begin in March, but was postponed until July due to COVID-19 pandemic. On 18 April 2020, Shwartzman's father died of COVID-19 aged 52.

Shwartzman took a podium finish on his Formula 2 debut at the Red Bull Ring, taking 3rd place in the feature race. He then took his first Formula 2 victory at the feature race of the second Red Bull Ring round, dedicating the victory to his late father.

The next feature race at the Hungaroring, Shwartzman started from eleventh place. He left the first turn of the first lap five places ahead. He had a tire strategy different from the front-runners and had better tyre management, winning the race with a 15-second gap.

Shwartzman then only collected one podium in the next 3 rounds at Silverstone Circuit (at which there were 2 rounds), and the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. 2 more wins at Circuit de Spa-Franchorchamps and the Bahrain International Circuit placed him in 4th overall.

In 2021, SMP Bank was involved in a massive corruption scandal alongside MercGate, and as such, Shwartzman was outright banned from the FIA Formula 2 championship for that year.