Ricciardo and Hartley get F1 call up
26 January 2010Carlin's 2009 British F3 champion Daniel Ricciardo and former Carlin ace Brendon Hartley will both become reserve drivers for Red Bull's two F1 teams in 2010. The Red Bull junior team members will alternate reserve driver duties on a race-by-race basis.
Ricciardo and Hartley are the two latest Carlin drivers to gain an official position within Red Bull's F1 teams. Red Bull Racing's star driver Sebastian Vettel raced with Carlin in 2006 and 2007 in Formula Renault 3.5, leading the championship before being called up as race driver for Toro Rosso mid way through the 2007 season.
Toro Rosso F1 driver Sebastian Buemi competed with Carlin in the Macau F3 Grand Prix in 2006, while his F1 team mate Jaime Alguersuari won the British F3 championship with Carlin in 2008 and dovetailed his first races in F1 last year with a seat in Carlin's Formula Renault 3.5 team.
Ricciardo and Hartley will familiarise themselves with all aspects of the two F1 teams; sitting-in on driver meetings, spending time with the current driver line-up and spending time on the pit wall during race weekends to prepare them for any stand in duties.
Carlin race director Trevor Carlin said of the duo, "We're very proud that former Carlin drivers have once again made the leap to F1 and both Daniel and Brendon are very deserving of this opportunity. Hopefully their reserve driver roles will lead to a race seat in the future. We aim to help all our drivers step up to the next level and work hard to give young drivers the best training possible. We're already excited about our 2010 line-up and believe we may have some more future F1 stars in Carlin cars again this season."