Virgin Racing finalised their driver line-up for 2010 by announcing 24-year old Spaniard Andy Soucek as the test and reserve driver for their inaugural season.
Soucek, who won last year's FIA Formula 2 Championship, will attend Grand Prix with the team, and will deputise for drivers Timo Glock and Lucas di Grassi if required. He will also compete in a variety of other motor racing series.
The team principal of Virgin Racing, John Booth praised the latest addition to the new outfit. “We are delighted to welcome Andy Soucek to Virgin Racing. He had a very good season in Formula 2 last year and a positive F1 test with Williams. He is certainly someone we have been keeping a close eye on as we believe he has a great deal of potential. We expect him to be a real asset to our development programme with the VR-01 and at the same time he provides the experience we need should he be required to deputise for one of the race drivers at short notice. We are pleased to have finalised our driver line-up and we look forward to having Andy alongside us in Barcelona later this week so he can spend some valuable familiarisation time with the team.”
Soucek thanked his new bosses for the faith shown in him, and is looking forward to the experience of being part of a Formula 1 team. “I am thrilled to be joining Virgin Racing. This role offers me a great opportunity to prepare myself for the Formula One environment, which is naturally where my longer-term ambitions lie. I look forward to learning from Timo and Lucas as well as soaking up as much information as possible from engineering meetings and time on the simulator. I would like to thank John Booth and Nick Wirth in particular for the faith they have shown in me at this stage in my career. It is exciting and very motivating to be part of a new structure in such a challenging sport and I hope that my experience can contribute a great deal to the development of the car and team in order to help us progress as quickly as possible.”
