were eighth places in Canada and Hungary and ninth in Japan. 1996 In he switched to Forti Corse to be teammates with Andrea Montermini after Pedro Diniz left to join Ligier. During the season, he was only able to qualify for six of the ten races the team entered. In the 1996 Argentine Grand Prix Badoer was involved in a heavy collision with Diniz, whose Ligier struck him from behind and flipped his Forti upside down. He emerged from the collision unhurt but Argentine safety marshals were heavily criticised for failing to assist Badoer in a timely manner because they feared a fire would break out. At Imola, Badoer had a newer car and outqualified Montermini by more than a second. He finished 10th and the last of the runners. In Monaco, Badoer remained at the back and collided with Jacques Villeneuve at Mirabeau forcing both drivers to retire. He did not qualify in Spain but started 20th in Canada. In France, Badoer started ahead of Eddie Irvine after the Ferrari was relegated to the back. Forti Corse folded after that year's British Grand Prix. FIA GT Championship In 1997 Badoer moved to the new FIA GT Championship, driving a Lotus Elise GT1 for GBF Engineering with co-driver Mimmo Schiattarella. Following retirements at Hockenheim and Silverstone, Badoer and Schiattarella finished 20th in Helsinki. The pair retired again at the Nurburgring and Zeltweg and finished 12th at Donington completing 151 laps. A race at Mugello saw Badoer retire with loose bodywork. While driving for GBF, Badoer was hired as Scuderia Ferrari's test driver, a role he maintained until 2010. Return to Formula One Minardi (1999) Badoer returned to Formula One racing in , again with the Minardi team. At Melbourne, Badoer raced as high as fifth at some point until gearbox problems forced him to retire with 15 laps to go. Prior to Brazil, he suffered a testing accident which left him with a broken hand. Stéphane Sarrazin took his seat for the race. He returned for Imola with his hand still causing problems but managed to finish eighth. He suffered from gearbox problems and a spin in Monaco and Spain. In July, Ferrari's number one driver Michael Schumacher broke his leg in an accident at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. As Ferrari's test driver, Badoer expected to be promoted to the race seat in Schumacher's absence, but the team