Jesse Krohn

Jesse Kurki-Suonio (born 3 September 1990), more commonly known as Jesse Krohn, is a Finnish professional racing driver, and BMW Motorsport works driver.

Jesse Krohn
Nationality	Finnish
Born	3 September 1990 Nurmijärvi (Finland)
Related to	Pertti Kurki-Suonio (Father) Jenni Krohn (Sister) Oskari Kurki-Suonio (Brother)
Italian Formula Three career
Debut season	2010
Current team	RP Motorsport
Car number	21
Previous series
2006 2007 2007 2008 2008 2008 2009	Formula Ford Finland Formula Ford UK Finnish Formula Three Formula Renault Finland Formula Renault NEZ Formula Renault Estonia Formula Renault UK
Championship titles
2008 2008 2008	Formula Renault Finland Formula Renault NEZ Formula Renault Estonia

He is notable for winning the Finnish, Northern European Zone (NEZ) and Estonian Formula Renault championships.

Krohn comes from a motorsport central family, with his father, Pertti, competing in the 1987 Finnish Formula Ford championship alongside 1998 and 1999 Formula One world champion Mika Häkkinen whilst his sister, Jenni, and brother, Oskari also compete in motorsport professionally in Finland.

Personal and early life

Jesse Krohn was born in Nurmijärvi, located in the southern Uusimaa region of Finland, during September 1990. His father, Pertti Kurki-Suonio was a racing driver. He competed in the Finnish Formula Ford championship alongside future Formula One drivers Mika Häkkinen and Mika Salo. However, despite finishing behind Salo and Häkkinen in the championship, Pertti's career never went beyond Scandinavia, excluding a one-off appearance at Brands Hatch for the Formula Ford festival.

His elder sister, Jenni, and younger brother, Oskari, are also both racing drivers both currently racing in their native Finland.

Racing career

Krohn began his career in karts when he was six, he spent nine years karting before moving up into car racing in 2005 as a test driver for saloon cars. In 2006, he competed in a number of Formula Ford events in his home country, finishing in eighth, and also competing in the Ford Ford Festival at Brands Hatch, finishing 10th, and also in the British Formula Ford Winter Series, finishing as runner up to Brit David Mayes. The Finn entered the full UK championship the following year as well as the Finnish Formula Three championship, "I was in a '97 Dallara with a H-pattern gearbox" Krohn recalls, "my shoulders were over the cockpit".[1] In the UK championship, Krohn finished the year in 17th with 82 points whilst he had a better time in Finnish Formula Three with six wins and finishing second overall in the championship. He also re-entered the Formula Ford festival as well, performing better than the previous year finishing eighth.

2008 was Krohn's best year yet, with three championship wins in the Finnish, Northern European Zone (NEZ) and Estonian Formula Renault championships, recording ten wins in total. He also competed in the British, Italian and Northern European championships as well, but experiencing little success by comparison. With a number of successes the previous year, Krohn entered the UK Formula Renault championship for the whole season where he has so far tallied 117 points, including a win at Thruxton.

Krohn gained some notoriety during the year as well after climbing up from twenty–fifth to seventh in the wet conditions at Donington Park but soon dropped out of the point after his suspension failed and so had to complete the final three laps on three wheels, "exactly what Jan Magnussen would have done" commented Mark Burdett Motorsport engineer Andy Miller, who ran the Danish driver during his 1994 British Formula 3 campaign.[1]

2014 saw Krohn admitted into the BMW Motorsport Junior Programme in which he trained in for three years, with established works drivers like Dirk Adorf and Jörg Müller. He won the 2017–18 Asian Le Mans Series GT Drivers title with Jun San Chen in the FIST-Team AAI BMW M6 GT3, and was promoted to BMW works driver in 2018.

Racing record

IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship series results

Year	Team	Make	Engine	Class	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	Rank	Points
2016	Turner Motorsport	GTD	BMW M6 GT3	BMW 4.4 L V8	DAY 5	SEB 7	LBH	LGA	DET	WGL	MOS	LIM	ELK	VIR	AUS	ATL	30th	52
2017	Turner Motorsport	GTD	BMW M6 GT3	BMW 4.4 L V8	DAY 8	SEB 20	LBH	AUS	DET	WGL	MOS	LIM 14	ELK 1	VIR 2	LGA 5	ATL 15	21st	160
2018	BMW Team RLL	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	BMW S63 4.0 L Twin-turbo V8	DAY 7	SEB 7	LBH 5	MDO 7	WGL 8	MOS 8	LIM 8	ELK 8	VIR 3	LGA 4	ATL 3		8th	278
2019	BMW Team RLL	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	BMW S63 4.0 L Twin-turbo V8	DAY 9	SEB 4	LBH 8	MDO 6	WGL 5	MOS 2	LIM 8	ELK 8	VIR 8	LGA 2	ATL 9		7th	279
2020	BMW Team RLL	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	BMW S63 4.0 L Twin-turbo V8	DAY 1	DAY 6	SEB 5	ELK 3	VIR 6	ATL 3	MDO 4	CLT 2	PET 3	LGA 4	SEB 3		2nd	319
2021	BMW Team RLL	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	BMW S63 4.0 L Turbo V8	DAY 3	SEB	WGL	MOS	LIM	ELK	VIR	LGA	LBH	PET			3rd*	325*

^* Season still in progress.

Complete 24 Hours of Daytona results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2016	Turner Motorsport	Michael Marsal Markus Palttala Maxime Martin	BMW M6 GT3	GTD	701	19th	5th
2017	Turner Motorsport	Justin Marks Jens Klingmann Maxime Martin	BMW M6 GT3	GTD	628	25th	8th
2018	BMW Team RLL	Nick Catsburg John Edwards Augusto Farfus	BMW M8 GTE	GTLM	773	18th	7th
2019	BMW Team RLL	John Edwards Chaz Mostert Alex Zanardi	BMW M8 GTE	GTLM	553	31st	9th
2020	BMW Team RLL	John Edwards Chaz Mostert Augusto Farfus	BMW M8 GTE	GTLM	786	13th	1st

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Entrant	Class	Chassis	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Rank	Points
2018–19	BMW Team MTEK	LMGTE Pro	BMW M8 GTE	BMW S63 4.0 L Turbo V8	SPA	LMS	SIL	FUJ	SHA	SEB	SPA	LMS 6	23rd	12

Complete 24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2019	BMW Team MTEK	António Félix da Costa Augusto Farfus	BMW M8 GTE	GTE Pro	335	30th	10th

References

1. "Introducing: Jesse Krohn". Autosport. Vol. 196 no. 11. June 2009. p. 59.

External links

• Official website
• Krohn's entry at Driver Database