Career
Before driving in the GP2 Series in 2006, he raced in the Spanish F3 Championship, where he finished 4th overall in the 2005 season, with the Racing Engineering team.
Graduating to GP2 with Racing Engineering the next year, his first season was pointless, but 2007 was a significant improvement. He took his first GP2 victory in 2007 at the sprint race at Magny-Cours. He started from second on the grid by dint of finishing seventh in the previous day's feature race. He then won the sprint races at the Nürburgring and Hungaroring from pole position. He stayed with Racing Engineering for a third season of GP2 in 2008. This season was disappointing as he slipped back to seventeenth in the championship, whereas team-mate Giorgio Pantano won it.
Villa drove for Super Nova Racing in the 2008–09 GP2 Asia Series season, and also drove for the team in the 2009 GP2 Series season. He was linked with a race seat at Formula One team Campos Grand Prix for 2010 but when they turned into Hispania Racing Team he wasn't linked anymore.
The 2010 season he forged links with BMW driving in the Spanish Mini Challenge Championship. He won that title and was rewarded with a drive in the final round of the 2010 Australian Mini Challenge in Sydney finishing seventh.
In 2011 Villa will move to the World Touring Car Championship with Proteam Motorsport BMW team, where he scored his first podium in Hungary. Unfortunately he had a disappointing end to the season falling out of the top ten finishing twelfth for the season. He was voted best rookie in the World Touring Car Championship for the 2011 season. He is currently being linked with the Formula One team Hispania Racing with a view to replace Vitantonio Liuzzi. If the reports are true he will drive in Friday practice sessions in the latter part of the seasion before racing in the final race of the year in Brazil. He again competed in the Spanish Mini Challenge in 2011 and despite missing three races, still finished in fifth position for the championship.
Read more about this topic: Javier Villa
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