SMP Racing

Founded	2013
Nation	👁 Russia Russia
Founder(s)	Boris Rotenberg
Base	Moscow, Russia
Website	www.smpracing.ru

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SMP Racing is a Russian racing team and driver academy mostly known for competing in the FIA World Endurance Championship, FIA Formula 2 Championship and FIA Formula 3 Championship with the goal of training and unveiling new talents^[1] from Russia.^[2] The team was founded in 2013 by Boris Rotenberg, co-founder of the SMP Bank of Russia.

SMP Racing is a prominent Russian motor racing team and driver development program founded in 2013 by Boris Rotenberg, co-founder of SMP Bank. The organization was created to discover and train Russian racing talent, guiding drivers through a structured "pyramid" from domestic karting to top-tier international series like Formula 1 and the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

The team was founded in 2012 by the Russian oligarch Boris Rotenberg, co-founder of SMP Bank and CEO of Russian race car construction company BR Engineering.

They first competed in the FIA World Endurance Championship with the goal of supporting new talents from Russia and giving them the chance to compete in international motorsport.

Born in Saint Petersburg, Russia on (1957-01-03) 3 January 1957 (age 69), Boris Rotenberg is known as the co-founder of SMP Bank and CEO of the largest construction company for gas pipelines and electrical power supply lines in Russia (StroyGazMontazh).^{[citation needed]}

In 2001 Boris and his brother founded the SMP Bank of Russia, one of the largest banks in Russia.

Boris is the CEO and founder of a race car construction company called BR Engineering. This company created the BR Engineering BR1 and BR Engineering BR01; both cars achieved podiums in their categories at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

On 8 July 2019, SMP announced that it was withdrawing their BR1 LMP1 cars from the 2019–20 WEC season only three weeks ahead of the Prologue pre-season test session. The team said in a statement that it had achieved the best possible results as a privateer LMP1 entry "given the circumstances" after its 3rd place podium result at the 2019 24h of Le Mans ahead of all other privateer entries and only behind two works Toyota TS050 Hybrids.^[3][4] It continued to sponsor the AF Corse GTE Pro cars until the conclusion of the 2019–20 WEC season.^[5]

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In May 2021, SMP and BR Engineering unveiled the BR03, a prototype sportscar intended for national-level endurance racing.^[6] It was first raced on-track at an exhibition race at Moscow Raceway in August 2025, and is planned to race as part of a monoclass in the Russian Circuit Racing Series starting in 2026.

The team went quiet across all of their social media accounts, along with a number of other Russian teams at the time which were competing in international motorsports.

The team also announced they would not return to the FIA World Endurance Championship or the European Le Mans Series.

This was expected, due to the FIA announcing new requirements for Russian drivers and teams competing in international motorsport as a response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.^{[citation needed]}

SMP Racing competed in the FIA World Endurance Championship full time between the years of 2014-2016. They made one return for the 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans and returned later for the 2018–19 FIA World Endurance Championship season.

The team were mildly successful throughout their whole time in the series. Their most successful year in the Championship came in 2015, where the team collected 6 podiums, 3 wins, and finished 1st in the LMGTE AM category.^[2]

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The team again had another mildly successful career at the 24 Hours of Le Mans by finishing first with Ferrari 458 GT2 in LMGTE category in 2015 and finishing third with BR1 LMP1 prototype in overall category in 2019 only behind two Toyota's, making them the fastest non-factory team.^[7]

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SMP Racing never had their own team in the FIA Formula 2 Championship. However, they still had a young driver program for young and upcoming Russian drivers such as Robert Shwartzman and Sergey Sirotkin.

The program was cancelled in May 2022 due to the FIA announcing requirements on Russian drivers competing in international motorsport. These rules were announced as a response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.^{[citation needed]}

Year	Class	Drivers	No.	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	T.C.	Points
2014	LMP2	👁 Russia Sergey Zlobin 👁 Italy Maurizio Mediani 👁 France Nicolas Minassian 👁 Russia Anton Ladygin 👁 Finland Mika Salo	27	SIL 3	SPA 4	LMS 1	COA 2	FUJ 3	SHA 2	BHR Ret	SÃO 2	1st	146
		👁 Russia Kirill Ladygin 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar 👁 Russia Anton Ladygin 👁 Italy Maurizio Mediani 👁 France Nicolas Minassian	37	SIL Ret	SPA 3	LMS Ret	COA Ret	FUJ 4	SHA 3	BHR 2	SÃO Ret	4th	60
2015	LMGTE AM	👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar 👁 Russia Aleksey Basov 👁 Italy Andrea Bertolini	72	SIL 3	SPA 3	LMS 1	NÜR 1	COA 1	FUJ 6	SHA 3	BHR 5	1st	165
2016	LMP2	👁 Italy Maurizio Mediani 👁 France Nicolas Minassian 👁 Russia David Markozov 👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin	27	SIL 9	SPA Ret	LMS 5	NÜR 8	MEX 6	COA 4	FUJ 8	SHA 6	BHR 8	8th	62
		👁 Russia Vitaly Petrov 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar 👁 Russia Kirill Ladygin	37	SIL 7	SPA 7	LMS 3	NÜR 6	MEX Ret	COA 6	FUJ 10	SHA 7	BHR 7	6th	71
2018–19	LMP1	👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin 👁 Russia Vitaly Petrov 👁 United Kingdom Jenson Button 👁 New Zealand Brendon Hartley 👁 Belgium Stoffel Vandoorne	11	SPA 5	LMS Ret	SIL Ret	FUJ 4	SHA 3	SEB 3	SPA 3	LMS 3	4th	94
		👁 France Stéphane Sarrazin 👁 Russia Egor Orudzhev 👁 Russia Matevos Isaakyan 👁 Russia Sergey Sirotkin	17	SPA Ret	LMS Ret	SIL 3	FUJ Ret	SHA Ret	SEB NC	SPA 4	LMS Ret	14th	27

Year	Entrant	No.	Car	Drivers	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2014	👁 Russia SMP Racing	27	Oreca 03R-Nissan	👁 Russia Anton Ladygin 👁 Finland Mika Salo 👁 Russia Sergey Zlobin	LMP2	303	37th	12th
		37		👁 Russia Kirill Ladygin 👁 Italy Maurizio Mediani 👁 France Nicolas Minassian		9	DNF	DNF
		72	Ferrari 458 Italia GT2	👁 Russia Aleksey Basov 👁 Italy Andrea Bertolini 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar	LMGTE Am	196	DNF	DNF
2015	👁 Russia SMP Racing	27	BR Engineering BR01-Nissan	👁 Russia David Markozov 👁 Italy Maurizio Mediani 👁 France Nicolas Minassian	LMP2	340	14th	6th
		37		👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin 👁 Russia Anton Ladygin 👁 Russia Kirill Ladygin		322	33rd	13th
		72	Ferrari 458 Italia GT2	👁 Russia Aleksey Basov 👁 Italy Andrea Bertolini 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar	LMGTE Am	332	20th	1st
2016	👁 Russia SMP Racing	27	BR Engineering BR01-Nissan	👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin 👁 Italy Maurizio Mediani 👁 France Nicolas Minassian	LMP2	347	11th	7th
		37		👁 Russia Kirill Ladygin 👁 Russia Vitaly Petrov 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar		353	7th	3rd
2017	👁 Russia SMP Racing	27	Dallara P217-Gibson	👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar 👁 Russia Sergey Sirotkin	LMP2	330	33rd	16th
2018	👁 Russia SMP Racing	11	BR Engineering BR1-AER	👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin 👁 United Kingdom Jenson Button 👁 Russia Vitaly Petrov	LMP1	315	DNF	DNF
		17		👁 Russia Matevos Isaakyan 👁 Russia Egor Orudzhev 👁 France Stéphane Sarrazin		123	DNF	DNF
		35	Dallara P217-Gibson	👁 France Norman Nato 👁 United Kingdom Harrison Newey 👁 Russia Viktor Shaytar	LMP2	345	14th	10th
2019	👁 Russia SMP Racing	11	BR Engineering BR1-AER	👁 Russia Mikhail Aleshin 👁 Russia Vitaly Petrov 👁 Belgium Stoffel Vandoorne	LMP1	379	3rd	3rd
		17		👁 Russia Egor Orudzhev 👁 France Stéphane Sarrazin 👁 Russia Sergey Sirotkin		163	DNF	DNF

Year	Car	Drivers	No.	1	2	3	4	T.C.	Points
2020	Ferrari 488 GT3	👁 Russia Sergey Sirotkin (All)[9] 👁 Spain Miguel Molina (Rd. 1-3)[10] 👁 Italy Davide Rigon(Rd. 1-3)[11] 👁 Italy Antonio Fuoco (Rd. 4)[12] 👁 Finland Toni Vilander (Rd. 4)[13]	72	IMO 20	SPA 14	NUR 19	LEC 7	1st[a]	80

Notes

SMP Racing also was a moniker for these teams, when SMP sponsored them:

• ADM Motorsport, a motor racing team based in Italy
• AF Corse, a motor racing team based in Italy
• AV Formula, a motor racing team based in Spain
• Comtec Racing, a motor racing team based in the United Kingdom
• Euronova Racing, a motor racing team based in Italy
• Koiranen GP, a motor racing team based in Finland
• Russian Bears Motorsport, a motor racing team based in Russia
• Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, а motor racing team based in the USA

• Escuderia Telmex, a Mexican team founded by similar ambitions

• Official website (in Russian)

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