John Rickard Rydell[1] (born 22 September 1967) is a Swedish retired racing driver. He won the 1998 British Touring Car Championship, the 2011 Scandinavian Touring Car Championship, and has also been a frontrunner in the European/World Touring Car Championship.
Early career
Rydell was born in Vallentuna, Stockholm. Initially he trained to be an accountant at AB Rydell,[2] his family's flower boutique business, but was bitten by the racing bug.[3] In the early 1990s, he raced in various Formula Three series. He also won pole position in the 1991 Macau Grand Prix, and won the 1992 race. He competed in Japanese F3 in 1992 and 1993, British F3 in 1989 and 1991, and the Swedish F3 series in 1987 and 1988. In 1990, he raced in F3000. In 1984–1985, he won the Swedish 100cc go kart championship.
Touring cars
BTCC
Rydell's first year in the BTCC was 1994, when his car was quite distinctive, driving a Volvo 850 Estate, when it was normal to race saloons. The TWR team switched to a saloon in 1995 and Rydell took pole for 13 of the 24 races, but due to several slow starts he won only four times and he finished on podium seven times. At the end of the year he was third in the championship, a result repeated in 1996 although Audi dominated with Frank Biela he was able to score four victories and six podiums. In 1997 Volvo switch from 850 saloon to new model Volvo S40, at the end of year he was fourth with one victory and five podiums. In 1998, he finally won the BTCC title in a Volvo with five victories and 12 podiums, beating Anthony Reid at the final meeting. He also won the 1998 Super Touring Bathurst 1000, sharing a Volvo S40 with Jim Richards. In 1999 he was again third behind the two Nissan Primera with four victories and seven podiums.
After five years with Volvo, Rydell was loaned to
GT racing
Rydell raced in the 2001 FIA GT Championship for Prodrive, after the team had built a Ferrari 550-GTS Maranello. The aim was to showcase the competitiveness of the car and tempt potential race teams to buy the vehicle from Prodrive. Consequently, there were numerous drivers of the vehicle that season, Rydell being one of them. He drove five races that year, finishing third at the Nurburgring and two overall victories at the A1 Ring and Jarama respectively.
Rydell moved back to touring cars for his full-time programmes from 2002, but competed with Prodrive in the Ferrari again at the 2002 24 Hours of Le Mans, sadly retiring. For the 2004 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Prodrive Ferrari-Rydell combination finished on the GTS-class podium in third, Rydell sharing the car with Darren Turner and rally-driver Colin McRae.
After a hiatus of two years, Rydell once again teamed up with Prodrive for the 2007 24 Hours of Le Mans, this time in an Aston Martin DBR9. Sharing the car with Darren Turner and David Brabham, Rydell won the GT1 class.
Racing record
Complete 24 Hours of Le Mans results
Complete Japanese Formula 3000 results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)
Complete British Touring Car Championship results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position – 1 point awarded 1996 onwards in all races) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap) ( * signifies that driver lead feature race for at least one lap – 1 point given)
Complete Swedish Touring Car Championship results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)
Complete European Touring Car Championship results
External links
References
- John Rickard Rydell allabolag.se, retrieved 4 December 2023^
- Blommor och växter i en mataffär nära dig – Blomsterboda rydells.se, retrieved 2025-02-08^
- Motorsport: Rydell's flower power success Independent.co.uk, 22 October 2011