WMC Driver Carousel, Pre-Season Update
motorsport-live.com February 15th, 2017
Breaking news from the
Steinmann camp. Surprisingly enough,
Steinmann was able to ink reigning World Champion
Harry Chapman to a three year extension worth $44.2M in total. There were rumors about him not wanting to return... but I guess winning cures all problems.
The
Scuderia Rossini announced Portugese driver
Rafael Rodriguez for 2017 and beyond on a three year contract. The 28-year old is Portugal's pride and will bring some serious marketability to the squad. Deemed as a master overtaker and the king of the apex,
Rodriguez drove for
Oranje GT in the International GT Championship, finishing 10th with two points and getting outpaced by his teammate... marketability could be the driving factor here.
Veteran
Niilo Saarinen, 2x a race winner in 2016, will join the
Van Dort Racing team, replacing German ace
Wolfgang Schmidt. The veteran will assume #1 status, and they announced the resigning of reserve driver
Sanjay Modi, finishing their driver lineup right away.
The new
Espirit GP team fill the vacancy of
Freya Larsen leaving into free agency by signing 19-year old hotshot
Rick De Graaf from
Rezzato Corsa on a $11.8M contract for next season. The young driver from the Netherlands finished eleventh in the Drivers World Championship with 15 points.
Replacing him at
Rezzato Corsa... will be
Wolfgang Schmidt, no surprise there. The 29-year old signed a $14.2M deal per year for the next three years. He netted three podiums in 2016.
And the
Lotus reserve seat is now filled as the team announced the signing of 18-year old British hotshot
Ellie Marsh as reserve driver for the next three years. She also took part in the BTCC last year, like
Winston Margate did, and here biggest strength is setting up the car... she is expected to take part in training in
Iker Vidal's car.