Stefan Johansson

Johansson began in kart racing, winning the Swedish Championship in 1973. He progressed to Formula Ford, winning the Swedish title in both 1977 and 1979. He then competed in the British Formula Three Championship from 1978 to 1980, winning the series in his final year driving for Ron Dennis' Project Four team — Dennis would later become chief executive of McLaren.

Johansson made his Formula One debut on 13 January 1980 for the Shadow Racing Team at the 1980 Argentine Grand Prix, but failed to qualify for both that race and the next in Brazil. He did not return to Formula One until 1983, having spent 1982 in the European Formula Two Championship with Spirit Racing, where he finished eighth overall with a best result of third at Mugello.

Johansson's first race with Spirit was the non-championship 1983 Race of Champions at Brands Hatch, where he retired on lap four with a Honda engine failure. He re-entered Formula One at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, qualifying 14th. He raced in five further Grands Prix in 1983, recording a best finish of seventh at the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort.

Johansson joined Tyrrell in 1984 as a replacement for the injured Martin Brundle at the British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch. He then drove for Toleman for the remaining Grands Prix of the season in place of the injured Johnny Cecotto, finishing fourth at the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. His Toleman teammate was Ayrton Senna.

Johansson signed with Toleman for 1985 but the deal fell through. He began 1985 at Tyrrell before being called up to Ferrari when René Arnoux was sacked after the opening race in Brazil. At the San Marino Grand Prix — Ferrari's home race — Johansson passed Senna's out-of-fuel Lotus to take the lead two laps from home, only to run out of fuel himself half a lap later. He achieved his maiden podium with second place in Canada, backing it up with another second at Detroit. His primary role was to support Michele Alboreto's championship challenge.

In 1986, Johansson regularly outpaced Alboreto despite the Italian being the team's lead driver. The Ferrari F1/86's V6 turbo matched the Honda, BMW, Renault and TAG-Porsche engines in power, but the car lacked downforce and handled poorly on anything but smooth circuits. Johansson finished fifth in the 1986 Drivers' Championship — his best-ever position — while Alboreto, who had finished second in 1985, dropped to ninth. Commentators including Murray Walker and 1976 World Champion James Hunt publicly suggested Ferrari were sacking the wrong driver when they replaced Johansson.

Gerhard Berger replaced Johansson at Ferrari for 1987, and Johansson moved to McLaren as number two driver behind double reigning World Champion Alain Prost. McLaren was less competitive than in 1984–1986; Prost added three wins and broke Jackie Stewart's record of 27 Grand Prix victories with his 28th win in Portugal. Johansson scored five podiums — including second behind Prost in Belgium, and podiums in Brazil, Spain and Japan — finishing sixth in the standings. He famously completed the 1987 German Grand Prix on three wheels after a puncture on the final lap. Ron Dennis had always intended to sign Ayrton Senna from Lotus for 1988, making Johansson's place a stop-gap.

Johansson joined Ligier for 1988, ironically alongside Arnoux whom he had replaced at Ferrari. The JS31, powered by a naturally aspirated Judd V8, was uncompetitive; Johansson recorded six non-qualifications during the season, including missing the French Grand Prix at Paul Ricard alongside Arnoux. His two best results were ninth-place finishes in the opening race in Brazil and the season finale in Australia.

Johansson led the new Onyx team from 1989. The car was temperamental but Johansson achieved a popular third place at the Portuguese Grand Prix — both his final podium and the team's only podium finish. He fell out with new team owner Peter Monteverdi in early 1990 and was dropped after the Brazilian Grand Prix, making further appearances for AGS and Footwork in 1991.

Over eleven seasons in Formula One driving for ten different teams, Johansson achieved 12 podiums and scored 88 championship points. His record of podium finishes without a victory was equalled by Nick Heidfeld at the 2009 Malaysian Grand Prix and then surpassed at the 2011 Malaysian Grand Prix.

Johansson moved to CART Championship Car for 1992, winning the Rookie of the Year title with two third-place finishes, ahead of Belgium's Éric Bachelart. He earned his first CART pole at Portland in 1993 but never won a race. From 1992 to 1996 he started 73 races, with his best season in 1994 when he finished 11th overall. He competed in the Indianapolis 500 in 1993, 1994 and 1995. At the 1996 Molson Indy Toronto, Johansson was involved in an accident that claimed the lives of fellow driver Jeff Krosnoff and track marshal Gary Avrin; after making wheel-to-wheel contact, Krosnoff's car struck barriers, a tree and a lamp post that was too close to the track.

Before his Formula One career, Johansson had won two World Sportscar Championship races: the Mugello round in 1983 driving a Joest Racing Porsche 956 with Bob Wollek, and the 1988 Spa-Francorchamps race in a Sauber C9 with Mauro Baldi.

After retiring from CART at the end of 1996, Johansson returned to sports car racing. In 1997 he won the 12 Hours of Sebring driving a Ferrari 333 SP with Andy Evans, Fermín Vélez and Yannick Dalmas. Later that year he won the 24 Hours of Le Mans in a TWR-Porsche WSC-95 for Joest Racing, co-driving with Alboreto and Tom Kristensen — for Kristensen the first of a record nine Le Mans victories. Johansson entered 15 editions of Le Mans between 1983 and 2012, taking three class wins in addition to his overall victory.

Subsequent sports car campaigns included the American Le Mans Series with a Reynard 2KQ prototype under Johansson-Matthews Racing in 2000 (the partnership later dissolved), an Audi R8 campaign in 2001 with backing from Gulf Oil and the assistance of Mike Earle's Arena team (co-drivers Guy Smith and Patrick Lemarie; Tom Coronel replacing Smith at Le Mans), and a 2002 season with the Miami-based Champion Racing team in an Audi R8 alongside Johnny Herbert.

In 2003 Johansson returned to CART as a team owner, running American Spirit Team Johansson with Jimmy Vasser and Ryan Hunter-Reay. Hunter-Reay scored a win in wet conditions at the Australian round, but the team folded at season end. Johansson drove in the Grand Prix Masters series in 2006 and competed in the inaugural FIA World Endurance Championship season.

Johansson has managed several racing drivers, including New Zealander Scott Dixon, Swedish Felix Rosenqvist (winner of the 2015 European Formula 3 Championship), Canadian Zachary Claman DeMelo, Romain Grosjean and Ed Jones.

This article is based solely on the supplied corpus. No external sources were consulted; claims that could not be substantiated against the corpus were omitted under the drop-the-claim rule.