Bourdais, Vettel to drive Ferraris in F1

As McLaren is moving towards becoming the first team with a serious customer supply deal, the rival F1 teams are beginning to react, knowing that McLaren stands to get an advantage if it uses all four cars successfully as this will mean that the chassis in question will get twice as much testing as its rivals and should therefore improve accordingly.

The team that is going to be most affected by such a development is Ferrari and so it is not real surprise to hear rumors that the Italian firm is in serious negotiations to create a similar situation. We are hearing that Ferrari is close to a deal with the South African Portuguese businessman Tony Teixeira.

He is the man who runs the A1GP Series and the suggestion we hear is that Teixeira will buy control of Scuderia Toro Rosso from Red Bull and this will then allow the team to be transformed into a serious Ferrari customer team. The team is currently being supplied with chassis by Red Bull Racing and uses Ferrari engines. As part of the deal there appears to be an arrangement in place that will see Ferrari named as the supplier of engines and chassis to the A1GP Series. This will produce some useful income for Ferrari and give the team connections in the business world in emerging markets in Asia and the Middle East, where A1 has had its most impact. Grandprix.com (Related rumor)