Sauber to make announcements on Wednesday
Nov.29 - Sauber is preparing to make some key announcements on Wednesday.
Blick newspaper reports that the Swiss team will confirm that its Ferrari engines will be rebranded as Alfa Romeo, while Charles Leclerc will join the team as driver.
It is a key sign that Sauber is moving closer to Ferrari, as Alfa Romeo is owned by Ferrari parent Fiat and Monaco-born Leclerc is a Ferrari junior driver.
Veteran Blick correspondent Roger Benoit says Leclerc, 20, will enter F1 in 2018 off the back of recent tragedy, after his father died in June.
"It was a very difficult time to lose first (friend) Jules (Bianchi) and then my dad. But I think it made me stronger and I see life differently now," he said.
Asked if he is worried that, as reigning Formula 2 champion, it will be difficult to start in F1 with a back-of-the-grid team, Leclerc answered: "No.
"I remember that Alonso started at Minardi."
Blick claims that Sauber will make the Alfa and Leclerc announcements after Ferrari president Sergio Marchionne approves the press statement.
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I feel happy when i saw here that Leclerc is coming to 2018 F1 season , he shows in minor category his quality by winning Gp3 in 2016 and Formula 2 in 2017 so is his moment and the big difference that he does winnig the F2 to his oponents show to everyone how good he is, i hope that in the future who come to F1 will be only winners in F2 or runners up a condition required to be a F1 driver. This rules make more fascinating to see this wonderfuul sport there is Formula 1.
He was good in F2 but F1 is a whole other "bollgame" and in a Sauber he will be a backmarker as long as Sauber use the Ferraris older traktor engines.
Few points: Sauber will be getting new engines from Ferrari, and if only GP2 "winners" or "runners up" fill F1 seats, we may lose a lot of talent from F3 and other categories. People have been saying for decades that paid drivers are not good for F1, but without them, for many teams would be impossible to stay, or even to start in F1. Many drivers would not have entered F1 at all (some should really not, but...) without those doors that helped a lot.
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