Leinders began in karting and won his very first competitive race. By the age of fourteen he had claimed a European karting title, beating future Formula One race winners including Jarno Trulli and Ralph Firman. In 1992 he was an official works driver for the Italian Tony Kart operation.
He transitioned to car racing through Formula Ford, where he proved immediately competitive. He took pole position at the Formula Ford Festival on his first attempt, a prestigious international shootout at Brands Hatch, and went on to win both the Benelux and British Formula Ford championships. Unable at that stage to secure sufficient funding for Formula Three, he entered the European Formula Opel Championship with Van Amersfoort Racing instead, recording eight victories and wrapping up the title with races to spare.
With greater backing secured, Leinders moved to the German Formula 3 series alongside Van Amersfoort Racing. He finished second on his maiden Formula Three weekend, beaten only by Nick Heidfeld. In his second season he won the German Formula Three championship outright and was invited by the McLaren Junior team to partner Heidfeld in the final round of the Formula 3000 season.
His strongest Formula 3000 campaign came in 2001, when he recorded two runner-up finishes behind Tomas Enge and Justin Wilson respectively. That same year the Royal Automobile Club of Belgium named him Champion of Belgium, an award presented by Crown Prince Philippe. Leinders was also pre-selected several times by journalists for the Belgian Sportsman of the Year title.
In 2002 and 2003 Leinders competed in the World Series by Nissan, finishing third in the championship standings on both occasions. Winning the final race of the 2003 season brought him to the attention of Formula One teams: he tested with the Jordan F1 Team and subsequently signed with Minardi as their official Friday test and reserve driver for the 2004 FIA Formula One World Championship.
Over the course of the season he appeared in seventeen Friday free practice sessions at Grand Prix weekends, gaining consistent mileage in the Minardi chassis. His performances earned him the Golden Helmet award in 2004, the most prestigious individual motorsport honour in Belgium.
From 2005 onward Leinders turned his attention to endurance and GT competition, racing in the FIA GT Championship with Belgian Racing aboard a Belgian-built Gillet Vertigo. In 2011 he became team principal of the rebranded Marc VDS Racing team, which also marked his final year as a full-time driver.
In 2014 he contested the full NASCAR Whelen Euro Series season in the Elite 1 category, driving a Toyota Camry for Marc VDS Racing. He finished fourteenth in the championship standings with two top-five results, at Brands Hatch and at Le Mans. Following Marc VDS's victory in the 2015 24 Hours of Spa, Leinders announced his departure from the team.
In 2016 Leinders moved into factory motorsport management, becoming sporting manager of the McLaren GT factory programme and team manager of Garage 59. In 2018 he joined Optimum Motorsport in a similar capacity. He has also worked as a colour analyst on Formula One broadcasts transmitted via Telenet's Play Sports channel in Belgium, leveraging his experience across multiple tiers of international competition.
Leinders represents a generation of Belgian drivers who competed successfully across the European junior single-seater ladder without securing a race seat in Formula One. His championship wins in Formula Ford and German Formula Three, combined with his sustained World Series by Nissan results, established his credentials as one of the more complete European junior drivers of his era. His later career in GT team management and NASCAR Europe demonstrated adaptability beyond the cockpit.
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