Roberto Moreno Born (1959-02-11) 11 February 1959 (age 53) Formula One World Championship career Nationality Brazilian Active years 1982, 1987, 1989–1992, 1995 Teams Lotus, AGS, Coloni, EuroBrun, Benetton, Jordan, Minardi, Andrea Moda and Forti Races 77 (42 starts) Championships 0 Wins 0 Podiums 1 Career points 15 Pole positions 0 Fastest laps 1 First race 1982 Dutch Grand Prix Last race 1995 Australian Grand Prix Roberto Moreno CART & Champ Car World Series Years active 1985–1986, 1996–2001, 2003, 2007 Teams Galles Racing Payton/Coyne Racing Bettenhausen Motorsports Newman/Haas Racing Project Indy PacWest Racing Patrick Racing Herdez Competition Pacific Coast Motorsports Starts 120 Wins 2 Poles 2 Best finish 3rd in 2000 Previous series 1980 1981–1982 1983 1984 1984–1985 1985–1988 1992 1993 1999, 2006–2007 2005, 2007 British Formula Ford 1600 British Formula Three North American Formula Mundial Formula Two Japanese Formula Two Formula 3000 Italian Superturismo Championship French Touring Car IRL IndyCar Series Rolex Sports Car Series Championship titles 1980 1980 1982 1988 British Formula Ford 1600 champion Formula Ford Festival winner Macau Grand Prix winner International Formula 3000 champion

Roberto Pupo Moreno (born February 11, 1959 in Rio de Janeiro^[1]), usually known as Roberto Moreno and also as Pupo Moreno, is a racing driver from Brazil. He participated in 75 Formula One Grands Prix, achieved 1 podium, and scored a total of 15 championship points. He raced in CART in 1986, and was Formula 3000 champion (in 1988) before joining Formula One full-time in 1989. He returned to CART in 1996 and raced full-time until 2003. Recently he has driven as a temporary substitute and test driver in both Champ Car and IndyCar.

Moreno was known as the "Super Sub" late in his career as he was used to replace injured drivers several times.

The Brazilian driver is also the sport godfather of young gun Julien Gerbi, recently seen in Formula Two and Formula 3000. Gerbi actually tested for the F3000 team Coloni Motorsport exactly twenty years after Moreno had been its official driver in Formula One.

Career[link]

Substitute[link]

Moreno stood in for Nigel Mansell at Lotus at the 1982 Dutch Grand Prix after Mansell broke his wrist in the previous Grand Prix at Canada. Underprepared, Moreno failed to qualify. It took his reputation a while to recover from this poor showing, but in 1987 he was called up to replace Pascal Fabre for the AGS team at the 1987 Japanese Grand Prix. In the following Australian Grand Prix, he took 6th place for his, and the team's, first ever point.

In this period, Moreno won the Australian Grand Prix three times (1981, 1983 and 1984) before it became a Formula One World Championship race.

Full-time Formula One[link]

Following his Formula 3000 Championship in 1988 (in which he drove a Reynard to the championship in the marque's first season in the formula), he signed a testing contract with Ferrari, who helped him land a racing drive with Coloni. The car was never competitive, however, and Moreno only made the grid four times.

Initially, 1990 seemed to be even less promising, with Moreno signing for the nosediving EuroBrun outfit, qualifying for just 2 out of 14 races. However, shortly after being informed the team would not be competing in the last two rounds of the season, he was contacted by Benetton to drive their second car, with Alessandro Nannini having lost a hand in a helicopter crash. Moreno finished an excellent 2nd on his Benetton debut in the 1990 Japanese Grand Prix, behind childhood friend and team-mate Nelson Piquet, although this result was helped by most other top cars dropping out, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna famously colliding at the first corner.

Moreno driving for Benetton at the 1991 United States Grand Prix.

For 1991, Benetton signed Moreno full-time. However, the Benetton B191, on Pirelli tyres, was not as competitive as anticipated, and Moreno's best results were 4th place at the Monaco Grand Prix and the Belgian Grand Prix (a race in which he set the fastest lap). The latter would be his last race for the team before he was controversially paid off and dropped in favour of Michael Schumacher. There are rumours to this day that Moreno was purposely driving within himself for the whole season in order to not show Piquet up. As it was, Moreno was offered the vacant Jordan drive for the 1991 Italian Grand Prix and the following race in Portugal, and raced for Minardi in the final race of the season, but Formula One seemed to have passed him by.

For the 1992 season, he found himself back with the minnows, signing for Andrea Moda. The outfit had risen from the ashes of Coloni, and after two non-starting races with Alex Caffi and Enrico Bertaggia, decided to start over with Moreno and Perry McCarthy. Moreno and McCarthy faced an uphill struggle, with the uncompetitive team scrambling to even get to most races. Moreno would only qualify the under-tested, under-funded car once, for the Monaco Grand Prix, before the team collapsed following team owner Andrea Sassetti's arrest at the Belgian Grand Prix.

An assortment of drives[link]

Moreno spent his last season of Formula One with the Forti team.

He spent the next two years racing Italian and French Touring Cars, and also attempted to qualify for the 1994 Indianapolis 500. 1995 saw a return to Formula One, with the ambitious Forti team. Moreno's Brazilian heritage helped him land the drive. Sadly, their car was laughably slow, and Moreno's best result was 14th in the Belgian Grand Prix. He would exit Formula One crashing into the pitlane wall at the Australian Grand Prix.

Champ Cars[link]

1996 would see Moreno resume his Champ Car career, as he raced a Payton-Coyne Lola-Ford, finishing 3rd at Michigan. For 1997 he drove for three teams, earning the epithet "Supersub", with his best result of 5th at Detroit in a Newman-Haas Swift-Ford. 1998 was more barren, with just three drives, though he came 6th at Twin Ring Motegi in the Project Indy Reynard Motorsport-Mercedes. The following season again saw him take two different cars (Newman/Haas and PacWest), with two 4th places his best. In 1999 he also made his first Indy Racing League start at Phoenix International Raceway finishing 6th and returned to the Indianapolis 500 after a 13 year absence finishing 20th for Truscelli Team Racing. 2000 finally saw him land a full-time drive in the Patrick Racing Reynard Motorsport-Ford, and he led the series for much of the distance, eventually ranking 3rd overall.

Moreno won his first Champ Car race at Cleveland, and in a scene scarcely seen in motor racing, the emotional Moreno wept openly. It had been his first race victory since his Formula 3000 victory twelve years earlier. He won again for Patrick Racing at Vancouver the following year, but was less consistent and dropped to 13th in the standings.

In 2003 he drove for Herdez Competition, taking his Lola-Cosworth to 2nd at Miami, and announced his retirement from motorsport at the end of the year.

In August 2006, Moreno became the first driver to test the new Panoz-built Champ Car. According to former series champion Paul Tracy, "[Moreno's] a guy who's not going to go out there and make mistakes and go off the road. They need to put miles on the car and run it fairly quickly, and he's the perfect guy for the job."^[2]

After running thousands of miles of testing in the Panoz DP01, Moreno got a chance to race it at the 2007 Grand Prix of Houston, substituting for the injured Alex Figge at Pacific Coast Motorsports.^[3]

IndyCar Series[link]

Practicing for the 2007 Indianapolis 500

In 2006, after contesting one Brazilian Stock Car race at Jacarepagua, he ran the IndyCar race at St. Petersburg, Florida, substituting for Ed Carpenter of Vision Racing.

Roberto drove as a replacement for an injured Stéphan Grégoire at the 2007 Indianapolis 500 for Chastain Motorsports. He crashed the car early in the race and finished in last place.

Helmet[link]

Moreno's helmet has traditionally been yellow, with blue, red, and white wings adorning the visor, sides, and chin area. Written on the lower portion of the helmet is the name "Moreno." Later versions of his helmet have included blue cylindrical designs along with the wings. His helmets are designed by Sid Mosca.

Race results[link]

Complete European Formula Two Championship results[link]

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap.)

Complete International Formula 3000 results[link]

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap.)

Complete Formula One results[link]

(key) (races in italics indicate fastest lap)

American Open-Wheel racing results[link]

(key)

CART/Champ Car[link]

Year	Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	Rank	Points
1985	Galles Racing	LBH	INDY	MIL	POR	MEA Ret	CLE Rpl	MIS1	ROA Ret	POC	MDO Ret	SAN	MIS2	LS Ret	PHX	MIA 5							28th	10
1986	Galles Racing	PHX1 Ret	LBH Ret	INDY Ret	MIL 13	POR Ret	MEA Ret	CLE Ret	TOR Ret	MIS1 6	POC 10	MDO Ret	SAN	MIS2 6	ROA Ret	LS Ret	PHX2 10	MIA Ret					16th	30
1994	Arizona Motorsport	SRF	PHX	LBH	INDY DNQ	MIL	DET	POR	CLE	TOR	MIS	MDO	NHM	VAN	ROA	NZR	LS						NC	–
1996	Payton/Coyne Racing	MIA 27	RIO 9	SRF 12	LBH 8	NZR 24	500 3	MIL 25	DET 23	POR 19	CLE 14	TOR 23	MIS 23	MDO 23	ROA 22	VAN 27	LS 12						21st	25
1997	Payton/Coyne Racing	MIA 24	SRF																				19th	16
	Newman/Haas Racing			LBH 24	NZR 14	RIO 18	GAT 25	MIL 10	DET 5	POR	CLE	TOR	MIS	MDO	ROA
	Bettenhausen Racing															VAN 15	LS 10	FON
1998	Project CART	MIA 15	MOT 26	LBH	NZR	RIO	GAT																31st	0
	Newman/Haas Racing							MIL 24	DET	POR	CLE	TOR	MIS	MDO	ROA	VAN	LAG	HOU	SRF	FON
1999	PacWest Racing	MIA	MOT	LBH	NZR	RIO 11	STL 4	MIL 12	POR 7	CLE 8	ROA 19	TOR 4	MIS 19										14th	58
	Newman/Haas Racing													DET 14	MDO 16	CHI 9	VAN 15	LS 2	HOU	SRF	FON
2000	Patrick Racing	MIA 2	LBH 9	RIO 6	MOT 3	NZR 14	MIL 5	DET 17	POR 2	CLE 1*	TOR 13	MIS 23	CHI 6	MDO 11	ROA 4	VAN 10	LS 25	STL 3	HOU 11	SRF 19	FON 2		3rd	147
2001	Patrick Racing	MTY 27	LBH 11	TXS NH	NZR 12	MOT 10	MIL 15	DET 3	POR 2	CLE 8	TOR 11	MIS 12	CHI 20	MDO 6	ROA 11	VAN 1	LAU 23	ROC 13	HOU 22	LS 22	SRF 22*	FON 19	13th	76
2003	Herdez Competition	STP 5	MTY 6	LBH 17	BRH 7	LAU 10	MIL 19	LS 15	POR 9	CLE 18	TOR 6	VAN 17	ROA 7	MDO 19	MTL 7	DEN 16	MIA 2	MXC	SRF 16				13th	67
2007	Pacific Coast Motorsports	LVG	LBH	HOU 12	POR	CLE	MTT	TOR	EDM	SJO	ROA	ZOL	ASN	SRF	MXC								22nd	9

IndyCar[link]

Year	Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	Rank	Points
1999	Truscelli Racing	WDW	PHX 6	INDY 20	TXS	PPIR	ATL	DOV	PPI2	LVS	TX2										29th	38
2006	Vision Racing	HMS	STP 18	MOT	INDY	WGL	TXS	RIR	KAN	NSH	MIL	MIS	KTY	SNM	CHI						30th	12
2007	Chastain Motorsports	HMS	STP	MOT	KAN	INDY 33	MIL	TXS	IOW	RIR	WGL	NSH	MDO	MIS	KTY	SNM	DET	CHI			36th	10
2008	Minardi Team USA HVM Racing	HMS	STP	MOT1 DNP	LBH1 17	KAN	INDY	MIL	TXS	IOW	RIR	WGL	NSH	MDO	EDM	KTY	SNM	DET	CHI	SRF2	NC	–

¹ Run on same day.

² Non-points race.

Indianapolis 500[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

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