Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur has revealed ahead of the Dutch Grand Prix this weekend that Robert Shwartzman will take Carlos Sainz’s Scuderia Ferrari car for FP1 as part of the mandatory rookie running required.
Photo credit: Scuderia Ferrari
The Russian-Israeli driver is also set to run in Abu Dhabi as each team must run a rookie in two practice sessions across the campaign.
Shwartzman won the FIA Formula 3 championship in 2019, and he backed that up by finishing 2nd to Oscar Piastri in the 2021 FIA Formula 2 championship.
The 23-year-old is no stranger to F1 running as he already ran for the Italian giants during FP1 at COTA and Abu Dhabi last year. He has also tested for Haas at the young driver’s test following the 2021 edition of the race held in the UAE.
With the ATA happening again at Monza next weekend, as well as sprint races at Qatar, COTA and Interlagos, it means the options to slot rookie drivers in for the mandatory sessions are quite limited.
Vasseur says Sainz made the call to give the Shwartzman the opportunity this weekend. It means he won’t have to give up his car at any point over the course of the last nine events.
“Robert will do Zandvoort in Carlos [Sainz’s] car, and he will do another one – probably Abu Dhabi – in Charles [Leclerc’s] car,” stated the French team principal as per RaceFans.net.
“I know that it’s not an easy situation, but Carlos was very direct. It’s not so easy to decide because for sure you can’t do it in Singapore, in Japan, in Las Vegas, and also you have some sprint events in Austin, Qatar and so that you can do it. Then you have the races with the tyre allocation a bit different. It’s also tricky to do it. But it means that at the end of the day you don’t have so many options.”
