Australian racer Daniel Ricciardo is taking a step up the F1 grid in 2012, moving on from HRT to Toro Rosso with the mouth-watering possibility that a Red Bull drive could be up for grabs at the end of the season.
Like many drivers, Ricciardo comes from a karting background, having started at nine years old before going on to winning the Western Australian Formula Ford Championship driving in a 15-year-old Van Diemen.
His success saw him win a scholarship into the Formula BMW Asian Championship with Eurasia Motorsport. He finished third in his debut season, taking two victories and a pole position. That year he also competed in the Formula BMW World Final with Fortec Motorsport, taking fifth place.
From there he moved to Formula Renault with Rp Motorsport, entering the European and Italian Championships of the category. He remained a part of the series in 2008, racing in the European and Western European Championships, taking his first European title in the Western European Cup and finishing second in the Eurocup to Finn Valtteri Bottas.
The Australian moved to the British Formula Three Championship in 2009 with Carlin Motorsport and won the title by 87 points from Walter Grubmüller. At the end of the year the Red Bull-backed starlet was handed the chance to test the energy drinks firm's F1 car in the Young Driver sessions at Jerez and the strong impression he made saw him named as their reserve driver for the following season, which he dovetailed with racing in the Formula Renault 3.5 Series with Tech 1 where he finished second.
And although he remained in the series for 2011, this time with ISR, Ricciardo's reputation was growing far beyond the junior categories and, on the back of another impressive appearance in the young driver test of the previous winter, he and was given the chance to take part in Friday practice sessions with Red Bull's junior team, Toro Rosso.
There was talk that his strong performances on Fridays would see him take a race seat away from one of the two regular Toro Rosso drivers. But instead, ahead of the British GP, it was announced that HRT had signed him for the remainder of the season in place of Narain Karthikeyan. It didn't take long for Ricciardo to take the fight to new team-mate Tonio Liuzzi, and with very few mistakes and a continuous upswing, it was the vastly more experienced Italian who was forced to make way when Karthikeyan made his expected one-off return for India's inaugural race.
And although Ricciardo 11 grands prix ended without a single point - his best finish was P18 - it was a productive stint for the Perth-born youngster.
And his Red Bull bosses agreed. In December Toro Rosso announced that Ricciardo would race for the midfield outfit in 2012 as they made a complete overhaul of their line-up. And with a Red Bull Racing vacancy potentially opening for 2013, the pressure is on for Ricciardo to not only perform but excel...
