A tortured journey back from F1's scrapheap

Brendon Hartley's unexpected arrival on the Formula 1 scene with Toro Rosso was one of the great stories of the 2017 season, and his experience provides a lesson to people in all walks of life about not giving up on your dreams.

Just a few months earlier the New Zealander's future was uncertain after Porsche announced its intention to quit the World Endurance Championship. And yet at the age of 28 he's heading into the 2018 season with a full-time F1 drive at Toro Rosso, eight years after being dropped from Red Bull's junior programme.

No-one could have predicted how things would turn out for him - a classic example of being in the right place, at the right time. His 2017 season ended with a hectic schedule that meant he was criss-crossing the globe, jumping from the Porsche to the Toro Rosso and back again. He barely had time to catch his breath.

"I guess I'm trying to absorb it," he told Autosport at the conclusion of a busy year. "Even after winning the world championship I guess I was not that emotional, because I've just got so much going on right now, and I'm trying to contain it all, keep focused and keep the sleep going.

"I know when everything stops I'll be able to look back and reflect and enjoy what's just happened. I am enjoying what's happening, but I'm trying to keep my feet on the ground, keep a lid on everything. Which is maybe not what people want to hear, but it's the truth actually.

"I've been pretty relaxed and calm though this whole process, and I think that's the best way for me to handle it at the moment."

It's easy to forget now how Hartley burst on the European scene as a Red Bull junior at the age of 17. He was quickly promoted to F1 reserve duty, but other quick guys were also on the way up. You're only as good as your last race, and in the middle of the 2010 season, he was dropped by Helmut Marko.

"Honestly, it was too much too soon for me," says Hartley. "That's nothing against Red Bull, but that's how it worked, it was sink or swim in a way. I didn't deal with it well. I was in line for an F1 drive, but I guess at the time I didn't see it. I was the reserve driver for Toro Rosso and Red Bull, and I was put in a situation where I was racing F3, I was racing World Series [Formula Renault 3.5], and I was going to the F1 races as a reserve driver.

"I had a few bad results, I lost confidence, I didn't deal with that pressure. I was very unhappy. And I didn't deal with it, I wasn't ready to deal with it. I know Max [Verstappen] came in and wasn't ready at that age.

"I was far from home, and my girlfriend was working in a restaurant to try and put food on the table. In some ways it was a good experience going through that and having to pick up the phone for myself"

"Also, and it was no disrespect to the people that did support me, but I was far from home as well. I left friends and family. I wasn't in the luxurious position where my family could travel around with me, they have to work for a living.

"I'm not pointing at anyone else, but honestly in my situation, I wasn't prepared for that. I've learned a lot from that whole experience, and I know myself a lot more than what I did back then. That's the truth of it, it was too much too soon."

He takes a remarkably upbeat view of the situation: "In some ways it was a bit of a relief. Deep down I knew I wasn't performing well. The year before Jaime Alguersuari took the Toro Rosso drive when I was the reserve driver, but in the weeks leading up to that decision, I did a couple of bad races, and that hurt. I think I never recovered from that situation, when Jaime took the F1 drive.

"I still remember that phone call, like it was yesterday. I didn't deal with that situation well, and that carried on to the end of that season and going into 2010. When I was let go from the programme there was no bitterness. I guess deep down I knew that I hadn't performed, and I hadn't done the job."

At Red Bull, as with other junior programmes, drivers are to a large degree cushioned from the harsh realities of the sporting world. Having been dropped, Hartley now had to use his own initiative as he attempted to save his career.

"It was almost like a fresh start. It was like, 'OK, what do I do know?'. I contacted every contact I had to look for advice and try and find drives. I didn't give up, but at the same time I probably didn't have an option to!

"I was far from home, and my girlfriend was working in a restaurant to try and put food on the table. We put everything we had into it, and we were pretty committed at that stage, living in Europe. In some ways it was a good experience going through that and having to pick up the phone for myself. In the Red Bull programme you're not exposed to that at all.

"At the end of the [2010] season I did a couple of races in GP2, I managed to put a little bit of a budget together. I found drives where other drivers hadn't paid, so they had to put someone in the car, those kinds of deals."

Dropped by Red Bull, he was recruited by another top F1 team, although he knew that there was no chance that he would actually race: "It was the next year that I started working for Mercedes, so I was pretty heavily involved in the development and the simulator, which was good for me.

"I did a young driver test with Mercedes as well in 2012. They were never looking at me to put me in the race car, but it was more for simulator correlation, so I had some on-track experience."

Against his own expectations Hartley eventually decided that sportscars would be the best way to kickstart his racing career.

"It was my friend Sebastien Buemi, who had just signed for Toyota, who I asked about endurance racing. I went to a test, and I took my helmet. I took a little bit of money that I'd saved up, I wanted to do some laps in a car just to show everyone, and I basically introduced myself to everyone in the pitlane.

"And from there I managed to do my first race in LMP2 at Spa, and that escalated to Le Mans, which I had to find some budget for, so I scrambled around and did it for the first time. I absolutely loved it, and did a good job. From there the next season went from a couple of races to doing a full season in LMP2, and a full season in America, and on top of that, the Mercedes work.

"It was just before the Budapest race that I called Helmut. I knew that they had a young driver test and I was thinking if there's even a chance if they're looking for someone to test, maybe there's some kind of role"

"And doing that was what got me picked up by Porsche, they saw that I did a good job in LMP2 and I worked hard at it.

"But it wasn't clear straight away that I would go to endurance racing, and If I'm perfectly honest it wasn't something I'd thought of. I'd never watched Le Mans in my life, but when I went there for the first time I loved it, I really, really enjoyed my time at Le Mans.

"When they signed me in some ways it was a similar situation to me arriving in Austin [with Toro Rosso]. A lot of people were surprised because there were other people more qualified at the time. I wasn't the obvious choice at all, but the timing was perfect for me because they wanted someone with Le Mans experience, I'd just done two, and they wanted someone young, because they were looking for the future."

Hartley soon demonstrated to Porsche that he was an inspired choice, and his four seasons with the team brought 12 race wins, including Le Mans last year. He also won the world championship in both 2015 and '17.

However, last summer the Stuttgart manufacturer confirmed 2017 would be its final fling in the WEC, and once again Hartley had to look for a new direction.

"It was very sad when we knew it was coming to an end. At that very moment I was not thinking that I was going to be racing F1! The dream's always been there in the back of my head, since as long as I can remember.

"Three or four years ago it was an amazing opportunity to be at Porsche, and I was really looking at a long-term future in endurance racing, which I love. Although the dream of F1 was always there, I'm normally quite realistic, and I didn't know if that was really going to be achievable."

He did have a head start. Despite being dropped from the junior programme, he had remained on good terms with the Red Bull hierarchy, and he hadn't been entirely forgotten.

"I'd kept in touch with Helmut over the last few years. I've had Red Bull on my helmet, supporting me. I went to the Austrian GP, because we did a Le Mans legends demo. I was hanging out with Helmut and Christian [Horner], and I saw all the guys. It was just about to be announced that Porsche would stop, but I wasn't sure yet. I'd caught up with everyone.

"It was just before the Budapest race that I called Helmut. I knew that they had a young driver test, and I didn't know who they were testing. And I was thinking there's even a chance if they're looking for someone to test, I have so much experience with complicated cars - maybe there's some kind of role going forward.

"So I called him, and I told him I'm a more rounded driver, I'm better, I'm stronger, all those things, and if there's ever a chance, my hand is up. He said he got the message, and you could feel that he was thinking about it. Even at that point I didn't believe that I was going to be in the race seat without even testing me.

"Two months after that call, they asked me to do a simulator test. I didn't ask any questions, I had no clue that they were looking at someone for Austin, potentially. I went to the test, and obviously it went quite well. They must have been pretty happy to put me in the car."

Sure enough, he got the call to fly to Austin and race for Toro Rosso. He had not driven an F1 car since his Mercedes test five years earlier, and yet he was quickly in the groove, finishing 13th on his debut. It soon became clear that Red Bull had long-term ambitions for him, and before the final race in Abu Dhabi - where he finished 15th - he was confirmed for 2018.

"The last stage happened very quickly. It's been surreal. OK, I never gave up, but at the same time I'm normally pretty realistic, and I knew outside of Red Bull there was probably not a lot of opportunity to come back to F1. I think a lot of the other teams don't look very far out of the pitlane."

Does he feel that he has set an example for others who have missed the boat, but may get another chance?

"The timing for me has been incredible, to have the past relationship with Red Bull... They are the ones who gave me the opportunity to race in Europe, never in a million years would I have been here without them. I didn't have the family money to do that.

"I'm well aware that I've been extremely lucky, and endurance racing teaches you a lot, also about your competitors, because you share a car with two other team-mates. There's no excuses, there's no hiding, it's the same car.

"There's a lot of incredible drivers out there who given the opportunity who could do the job, and I'm old enough and mature enough to see that now. That's one of the good things about endurance racing, you gain a lot of respect for your competitors.

"I've been very lucky to have the experience and exposure in LMP1, which in some ways is a very good teacher."

Hartley believes he's much maturer than during his first spell at Red Bull, when things happened too quickly for him. That experience will prove invaluable in 2018.

"I have grown up a lot, I think it's normal for any person. I'm very different, actually. I'm more relaxed, I have experience, I see the bigger picture more, I know myself more. Especially the last three or four years, working with Mark Webber, representing a big brand like Porsche, on a world stage at Le Mans, you learn a lot, and you grow a lot.

"It's quite normal at 17 or 18 you have growing up to do. Obviously Max was massively impressive when he came into F1 at that age with that amount of composure, but at that age I wasn't ready. I'm not embarrassed about that. I think a lot of us could say the same."