With Narain Karthikeyan and Heikki Kovalainen being named as possible replacements for Razia, it was Bianchi who got the 2013 drive at Marussia. The 23 year old Frenchman, who will take part in the last two test days at the Circuit de Catalunya, is happy to have joined F1 after his chances to secure a seat earlier in the week seemed to be over.
“I am thrilled to have secured a race seat with the Marussia F1 Team," Bianchi said. "Racing in Formula 1 this season has been my goal over the winter and after evaluating a number of options I am very excited to have this opportunity to demonstrate that I am ready for this next step in my racing career. I am also very grateful to the Ferrari Driver Academy that has always supported me and has given me the possibility to mature as a racing driver enabling me to be fully prepared for this new exciting challenge. The next two weeks of preparation for the season will be incredibly busy but I am ready to get started tomorrow with my first day in the MR02.”
We're pleased to announce that we've appointed Jules Bianchi to a race seat. This follows the termination of our contract with Luiz Razia
— Marussia F1 Team (@Marussia_F1Team) March 1, 2013
Good news for @jules_bianchi ! Vous reconnaissez tout le monde sur cette photo 😆 #Longtimeago twitter.com/JeanEricVergne…
— Jean-Eric Vergne (@JeanEricVergne) March 1, 2013
