Richard Dean

Richard Antony Dean (born 7 October 1965) is a former British racing driver who won the 24 Hours of Le Mans GT2 class in 2006. In 2010, Richard Dean founded the sports car racing team United Autosports with Zak Brown.

Racing career

Early career Dean started his competitive racing career in karts as a teenager. In 1985, Richard progressed to car racing in Formula Ford 1600. with multiple race wins, and finishing sixth in the 1987 Formula Ford Festival, he moved up to contest the 1989 British F3 Championship. and winning the Oulton Park Gold Cup race in the 1990 British Formula 3000 Championship with Cobra Motorsport. He stayed in Japan until 1995, racing in F3, F3000, GT, and Touring Cars. scoring nine wins in 16 races and winning the title by more than 100 points. In 1998, he won the British GT Championship driving an Oreca prepared Dodge Viper In 1999, Dean began racing in the American Le Mans Series – firstly in the prototype class (1999), then the GT class (2000 & 2002), LMP900 class (2001) and GT2 class (2005 & 2006). In 2006, Dean came second in the GT2 team championship standings with Team LNT. He was racing with fellow British co-drivers Lawrence Tomlinson and Tom Kimber-Smith as part of Team LNT. Dean and the team made history that day as the only car to have beaten a Porsche in the GT2 class at Le Mans. The team's first race was in the 2010 British GT Championship at Oulton Park.

United Autosports is now a championship-winning sports car racing team, competing in sports prototype and GT categories across the world including the European Le Mans Series, FIA World Endurance Championship, and GT4 European Series.

In 2020, United Autosports became the first team to win three prestigious endurance accolades in the same year – the European Le Mans Series, World Endurance Championship and the 24 Hours of Le Mans (LMP2 class).

It also has a dedicated historic team who race in classic events around the world including the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion, Silverstone Classic, Velocity Invitational and Estoril Classic. Richard Dean has raced at a number of these events in cars from Zak Brown’s personal collection.

Personal life Dean lives in Yorkshire with his wife, former professional tennis player Alice Mackenzie, and dogs. He is the son of former racing driver Tony Dean and he has one daughter, Ashleigh, who was born in 1992.