In an uncompetitive car, he was only capable of 9 points all season, including a second place at the German round of the championship at the Hockenheimring.

He stepped back down into the Italian F3 series in 1992, before making a return to Formula 3000 in 1993, driving a Reynard 93D Judd for the Mythos team.

He moved to the Super Nova team for 1994 and mounted a challenge for the championship despite not winning any races, eventually finishing fourth.

He stayed at Super Nova for 1995 where he won three races and beat his teammate Ricardo Rosset to the F3000 title.

Sospiri revealed, in a 2022 YouTube interview with a fan, that his biggest heroes in racing were Ayrton Senna and Dan Gurney, for whom he would later drive.

[3] He had tested for the Simtek Formula One team at Estoril in 1994, but was unable to raise enough funds to gain a race seat at the time.

Despite winning the Formula 3000 title in 1995, very few options were available for Sospiri, so he chose to take the role of official Benetton test driver for the year.

Sospiri hoped to return to the grid in Brazil, but the team was withdrawn due to the massive debts incurred by its failing Formula One effort.

I had the opportunity to stay with Benetton for 1997 as a test driver but I wanted a race seat, and I had this offer from [Lola backer] MasterCard to sign for four seasons.

[The Lola drive] was a great opportunity, I had always dreamt of getting to F1 in a race seat and I didn’t want to be a test driver for another year.

[5] He was named to an ISM Racing entry for the 1999 Indianapolis 500 but the car was driven by Brian Tyler instead, who failed to qualify.