Sakon Yamamoto to be reserve driver of HRT

HRT F1 Team, Hispania Racing, has signed Japanese driver Sakon Yamamoto as official test driver and reserve race driver for the 2010 season.

Sakon Yamamoto will join the HRT F1 Team driver line-up with race drivers Indian Karun Chandhok and Brazilian Bruno Senna. Sakon Yamamoto got his first taste of F1 in 2005, as the Friday test driver for Jordan GP at the Japanese Grand Prix. He continued racing in the Formula Nippon and Super GT series in 2006 but also earned a full-time F1 race drive with the Super Aguri F1 Team. The following year he joined the GP2 Series while testing for the Super Aguri F1 Team and also racing for the Spyker F1 Team from the Hungarian Grand Prix onwards. In 2008, Sakon joined the Renault F1 team's development driver programme while continuing to race in GP2 and the GP2 Asia series where he also continued racing in 2009.

Sakon Yamamoto: "I am very pleased to be joining the HRT F1 Team. It is fantastic to be part of a new team and I hope I will be able to gather useful data whenever possible on Friday for the race drivers. I have seen how committed everyone at the team is and I feel the same. I will be doing my very best to support Karun and Bruno this year. I'm proud to work with this Spanish team, because Spain is like my second home as I also live in Barcelona."

Dr. Colin Kolles, Team Principal, HRT F1 Team: "It's a great pleasure for us to have signed Japanese Sakon Yamamoto as our test driver and reserve race driver for the 2010 season. I am confident that his input into the development of our car will be useful and means another reinforcement of our team as the European season starts in Barcelona. We look forward to welcoming Sakon to the team and working closely with him. His addition makes HRT F1 Team one of the most international teams in the paddock."

-source: hrt