F1 News: Ferrari Confirm Carlos Sainz Replacement For Dutch GP FP1

From 2022, a rule made it mandatory for F1 teams to offer two first free practice sessions in a season to a rookie driver to promote young talents having high chances of racing in Formula 1 in the future. The criteria for rookies to take advantage of this rule is simple- they must have driven in less than two Grand Prix.

Scuderia Ferrari team boss Frederic Vasseur confirmed in an interview that 23-year-old Ferrari junior Robert Shwartzman would receive the opportunity during the Dutch Grand Prix weekend to drive Carlos Sainz's F1 car in FP1. Later during the season, the Israeli racing driver would receive his second chance by driving Charles Leclerc's F1 car in VT1 for 60 minutes. Commenting on the limited track options for the rookie test, Vasseur said:

“Robert will do Zandvoort in Carlos' car, and he'll do another one, probably Abu Dhabi, in Charles' car.

It was the choice of the driver, I gave them the choice to do it where they want to do it. I know that it's not an easy situation. But Carlos was [ok with] the idea.

It's not so easy to decide because for sure you can't do it in Singapore, in Japan, in Las Vegas. Also, you have some sprint events in Austin, Qatar, so that you can’t do it.

Then you have the races with the tyre allocation a bit different, it's also so tricky to do it. It means that at the end of the day, you don't have so many options."

Listen To The Latest Driven Mad Podcast Episode

The junior driver posted impressive results when he finished second in the 2021 Formula 2 championship and has been a test driver since. Currently, Shwartzman is competing in the 2023 GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup for AF Corse.

The other potential juniors like Arthur Leclerc and Oliver Bearman would have to wait another year for their chance of driving an SF-23 F1 car. However, Vasseur assured that he'd try his best to give them a chance but stressed that they'll have to continue to focus on the F2 Championship. He added:

"They have to be focused on the F2 championship. And we will try to give them opportunities of testing either on the 2021 car or something else before the end of the season. But I want to push them to stay focussed on the F2 championship."