Dean O'Lauchlan

Dean O'Lauchlan (born 18 September, 1981 in Bathurst, Australia) is an Australian racing driver most famous for his stint in the Formula 1 Rejects World Race Series as well as a successful dirt racing career both in Australasia and the United States.

Early Racing Career
O'Lauchlan first made a name for himself in karting categories across New South Wales competing against the likes of his close friend and later multiple F1 world champion Daniel Melrose and another future F1 driver, Dave Simpson. However unlike either of them O'Lauchlan raced in the Konica Minolta V8 Supercar Series in 2004 for Brad Jones Racing. He did poorly in the series compared to teammate Andrew Jones though, finishing a lowly 21st in the championship. In 2005 O'Lauchlan bought a Porsche Carrera, started his own team O'Lauchlan Motorsport and joined the Australian Porsche Carrera Cup Championship. He drove fairly competitively as he scored the occasional podium finish in races until the category's collapse at the end of 2008.

Desperate for a racing gig, O'Lauchlan had a go at dirt track racing in the beginning of 2009. Immediately it was clear that O'Lauchlan was incredibly talented in this form of racing as he won many events in different categories on both sides of the Tasman Sea. In 2010 he focused on the major events and ended up simultaneously winning the 2010 Australian SprintCar Championship and the New Zealand Championship as well. In 2011 he went over to the United States to drive in several championships in the Pro-Stock series. He finished 5th in the Lagoon Local Series and 13th in the Taylor Wings Figure 8s Championship despite only competing in two of the season's four events.

F1RWRS Career
Despite his success on dirt tracks O'Lauchlan's dream was always to drive in top-line single seater racing. He achieved just that by joining the F1RWRS in 2012 with his own team using what was effectively the Melrose Racing Team package from the previous season and sponsorship from American delivery giant United Parcel Service. Immediately it became apparent that the car was nowhere near as competitive in the hands of O'Lauchlan as it was in the hands of MRT's drivers Melrose and Jeroen Krautmeir as more often that not he failed to pre-qualify for the races. In the chaotic weekend at Bathurst he made it to the end of an attrition-filled race in fifth place, scoring his first points in the series. He put in by far he best performance of the season at the championship-deciding Budweiser 500 as the car he was using proved to be far more effective on the oval than anywhere else that season. Here he led a number of laps before finishing sixth and taking fastest lap in the process while his teammate Frank Zimmer, driving a one-off for the team, finished seventh.

For 2013 O'Lauchlan remained at the now-renamed Horizon Motorsport team which had been put under complete control of MRT. However both teams suffered with the all new BMW engine proving underpowered and uncompetitive which meant O'Lauchlan was eliminated from every race by Friday afternoon. Dis-heatened by the lack of performance by the team, he retired at the end of the year from the series to focus on racing open wheelers in the United States.

That retirement from the series was short lived however as he returned to the F1RWRS after coming heartbreakingly close to his first IndyCar series win at Milwaukee. The Holden Racing Team had lost patience with their driver Ashley Watkinson after a series of high-profile accidents and his lack of intent to address the issues which ultimately saw him sacked by the team. Joining Holden for the eighth race of the year at Brands Hatch, O'Lauchlan saw out the remainder of the year with the team but struggled with reliability, scoring no points and finishing only two of his nine races, with a best result of eighth in China.

Holden chose not to retain O'Lauchlan's services for 2015 and instead he switched to another Australian team, the newly-formed Autodynamics squad. Pre-qualifying was a near-certainty for the fledgling team however and, struggling for money and performance, O'Lauchlan was forced aside after just a single failure to pre-qualify at the opening race in Adelaide. Replaced by firstly Sebastian Groves and then pay driver Miko Fäkkinen, O'Lauchlan remained at the team in a test and reserve driver role, and it was through this that he made what would prove to be his final F1RWRS appearance. Teammate Damon Cannon was injured in a crash at the Canadian GP, in what ended up being the team's only race start all season, with Dean filling in at the following race in Britain. Unsurprisingly, he failed to pre-qualify.