Fairuz Fauzy had his first F1 break with Spyker in 2007 when he was one of the team’s five nominated reserve drivers.
In 2010 the Malaysian was signed up by Lotus as the team’s official (and only) third driver.
Born in Kuala Lumpur, Fauzy pursued a racing career in Britain in the domestic Formula Ford, Formula Renault and Formula Three championships. He contested the inaugural GP2 championship in 2005 but failed to score a point with DAMS and again in 2006 with Super Nova.
He later made appearances in GP2 Asia, winning at Sentul in 2008, and driving for Team Malaysia in A1 Grand Prix, winning at Zandvoort the same year.
But his main focus was the World Series by Renault. Fauzy finished runner-up in the category to Bertrand Baguette in 2009, winning the Hungarian round.
In his testing role for Lotus he had the responsibility of shaking down the T127 at Silverstone, appeared for the team in testing and was given the chance to drive in five official practice sessions during the year.
He was not retained by the team for 2011 and joined Renault as their reserve driver for 2011.