Christophe Tinseau

{{short description|French racing driver}}

{{Infobox racing driver

| name = Christophe Tinseau

| image = ChristopheTinseau.JPG

| caption = Tinseau in 2011

| nationality = {{flagicon|FRA}} French

| birth_date = {{birth-date and age|18 December 1969}}

| birth_place =

| module1 =

{{Infobox Le Mans driver|subbox=yes

| Years = {{24hLM|1998}}-{{24hLM|2003}}, {{24hLM|2007}}-{{24hLM|2009}}, {{24hLM|2011}}-{{24hLM|2012}}, {{24hLM|2016}}

| Team(s) = Panoz Motorsports
DAMS
Team Cadillac
Riley & Scott Racing
Pescarolo Sport
Thiriet by TDS Racing

| Best Finish = 7th ({{24hLM|2008}})

| Class Wins = 0

}}

}}

Christophe Raymond Jean Tinseau (born 18 December 1969) is a French racing driver from Orléans.

Tinseau began racing professionally in French Formula Renault in 1991. In 1992 he moved to French Formula Three and in 1993 he placed 4th in that championship with 2 wins and finished 10th in the Macau Grand Prix. In 1994 he was the championship runner-up in French F3 and in 1995 he moved up to Formula 3000 where he finished 16th with 7 race starts. In 1996 he improved to 6th in F3000, winning the season-ending race at Hockenheim. In 1997 he raced in Indy Lights but only managed an 11th place championship finish, ending up on the podium once at Circuit Trois-Rivières. After the seeming decline in his open-wheel fortunes, Tinseau moved to sports cars for 1998 driving a Panoz Esperante GTR-1 for DAMS, making his 24 Hours of Le Mans debut. In 1999, still with DAMS he piloted a Judd powered Lola B98/10 for and won two races in the Sports Racing World Cup. From 2000 to 2002 he drove the historic Cadillac Northstar LMP at Le Mans, finishing 5th in class in 2001. He competed part-time in various series from 2003 to 2005, but returned to full-time racing in 2006 when he finished 6th in Porsche Carrera Cup France. He made 6 Le Mans Series starts and finished 6th at Le Mans for Pescarolo Sport in 2007. He continued with the team in 2008 and finished 7th at Le Mans and 8th in LMS points and continued with the team in 2009, finishing second in Le Mans Series. In 2010 he competed in the NASCAR Whelen Euro Series, finishing eighth with one win. In 2011 he returned to Le Mans Series with Pescarolo and finished fourth in the championship. In 2012 he competed in a handful of major endurance races, and since then has been largely retired.[https://www.driverdb.com/drivers/christophe-tinseau/ Christophe Tineseu], Driver Database, Retrieved 2015-02-07 He has founded a racing school for ice racing.[http://www.icedriving-institute.com/ Ice Driving by Tinseau] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150208003900/http://www.icedriving-institute.com/ |date=2015-02-08 }} {{in lang|fr}}, Retrieved 2015-02-07