Sutil And Petrov Poised To Become Ferrari Test Drivers?

 

With Jules Bianchi joining Force India, Ferrari had reportedly signed GP2 driver Davide Rigon as their new test driver. However reports from Maranello have emerged that Ferrari deem the Italian as unready to step into Fernando Alonso’s or Felipe Massa’s seat if the necessity arises.

With this in mind, speculation has arisen that Ferrari could be poised to sign German Adrian Sutil and Russian Vitaly Petrov instead, with both drivers’ seemingly without a drive for the approaching 2012 season. Both would become the Maranello based teams test and reserver drivers’, replacing Jules Bianchi.

Russian driver Vitaly Petrov, who was replaced at Lotus by Romain Grosjean for 2012 and who was reported to be in talks with Caterham about a possible drive, has played down these rumors, “If you want to go to Ferrari, you don’t want to go for one year only,” insisted the Russian. “I can’t say whether it has been discussed or not, but for me I think it is too early to go to Ferrari. Maybe in one or two years the time will be right.”

Adrian Sutil, who is coming off the back of the court case in Munich, has remained silent about a possible move to Ferrari, however shortly after his court case he did hint at possibly having a year away from motor sport. Whether the lure of becoming a Ferrari driver is too great for him to turn down or not, time will tell.

Both drivers’ were on the grid in 2011, and scored points consistently throughout the season. It is undeniable that the only option for them both is to accept a test driver role, as all of the seats for the 12 teams on the grid have now eventually been snapped up.