Wurz was born in Waidhofen an der Thaya, Lower Austria, the son of former European Rallycross Champion Franz Wurz. Before turning to circuit racing he won the BMX World Championship in 1986 at the age of 12. He began motorsport in Formula Ford in 1991, moved to the German Formula Three Championship in 1993, and by 1996 was driving for Joest Racing in the DTM in an Opel Calibra. That same 1996 season Wurz, alongside Davy Jones and Manuel Reuter, won the 24 Hours of Le Mans — at age 22, becoming the youngest winner of the race at that time, a record he still holds.
Wurz's Formula One debut came in June 1997 at Montreal, filling in for injured Gerhard Berger at Benetton. He finished third at the 1997 British Grand Prix in just his third start. Given a full race seat for 1998 alongside Giancarlo Fisichella, he outscored his teammate to finish joint seventh in the championship. A notable moment came at Monaco that year when Michael Schumacher collided with him while attempting to pass at the Loews hairpin, breaking Wurz's suspension and ending his podium challenge.
After a difficult 1999–2000 period with Benetton, he transitioned to a test driver role at McLaren from 2001. He made a one-off appearance for McLaren at the 2005 San Marino Grand Prix, finishing on the podium — a gap of eight years between his second and third Formula One podiums, a record at the time for the longest interval between podium finishes.
For 2007, Wurz joined Williams as a full-time race driver alongside Nico Rosberg. He scored his third and final podium at the Canadian Grand Prix, starting from 19th on the grid. He announced his retirement from Formula One in October 2007, citing doubts about his own commitment.
Wurz rejoined the front of the endurance field with Peugeot, winning the 2009 24 Hours of Le Mans alongside Marc Gené and David Brabham in a works Peugeot 908. That victory completed an unusual career arc: his 1996 win had come with a diesel-rival-era Joest Porsche prototype, while his 2009 win was with a diesel-powered Peugeot at the height of the manufacturer's dominance of Le Mans. In 2010 he also claimed the 12 Hours of Sebring and the 1000 Miles of Road Atlanta with Peugeot, winning three of the major sportscar classics under the French banner. He drove for Toyota Motorsports in 2012 in their LMP1 Hybrid programme.
Since retirement from full-time racing Wurz has been Chairman of the Grand Prix Drivers' Association since October 2014, making him the longest-serving GPDA head. He was a prominent advocate for the Halo cockpit protection device, arguing its safety function had to take precedence over aesthetic concerns. He serves on FIA safety commissions, contributing to circuit homologation and runoff standards.
Wurz co-founded Test and Training International (TTI) in 2006 with his father, a road-safety and driver-training company operating from Vienna, Teesdorf, and Monaco. TTI received the Prince Michael International Road Safety Award in 2015 and has influenced road safety legislation in multiple European countries. A TTI subsidiary, Wurz Design, focuses on circuit design; notable projects include masterplanning for Qiddiya Speed Park in Saudi Arabia, future host of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
He has also been an F1 television commentator for Austrian broadcaster ORF. His son Charlie has competed in FIA Formula 3, and his youngest son Oscar won the 2024 Formula 4 CEZ Championship.
Wurz occupies a distinctive place in motorsport: an Austrian driver who broke the Le Mans age record as a relative unknown, spent a decade in Formula One without a race win but delivered podiums across multiple decades, and then channelled his technical intelligence into safety advocacy and track design. His 13-year gap between Le Mans victories remains a record, and the institutional influence he has exercised through the GPDA — particularly on the Halo device — has shaped the safety landscape of modern Formula One.
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