Heikki Kovalainen Rejoins Caterham As Reserve Driver

After leaving CaterhamCaterhamUnited Kingdom, 1973 > present9 models
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at the end of last season, Heikki Kovalainen will return to the team from the Bahrain Grand Prix onwards as a reserve driver for the team. Kovalainen will drive the car during the first practice on Thursday. Caterham is also sending Alexander Rossi to its Caterham Racing GP2 team and replacing him with its GP2 driver Ma Qing Hua. 

Caterham says that Kovalainen will also drive in FP1 during the next race in Catalunya. He will be responsible for giving the team feedback on the updates it has installed to the CT03Caterham CT03United Kingdom, 2013 > 201313 photos
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“It’s obviously great news that I’ll be on track in Bahrain and Spain and I’m really looking forward to getting back to work and helping the team as much as I can.

"I’m physically ready to get back into the car and I know my experience can help give the team new ideas and options for directions to take on setup and strategy. I’m looking forward to getting back to work," said Kovalainen.

Kovalainen raced for Caterham from 2010 to 2012, but Caterham dropped both him and Vitaly Petrov for the 2013 season. Their replacements Charles Pic and Giedo van der Garde have yet to score any points this season, and the team's best finish this year was 14th place from Pic in Malaysia.

Caterham also announced that Ma Qing Hua would replace Alexander Rossi as the team's second reserve driver. Hua became the first Chinese driver ever to participate in F1 when he drove for Caterham during FP1 in Shanghai last weekend. Hua previously raced for Caterham's GP2 team, and Alexander Rossi will replace him there. 

“After Ma’s successful run in FP1 in China a number of new opportunities have arisen for him and we have decided to restructure our current line-up,” said team principal Cyril Abiteboul.

Source: Formula 1