The 2009 Formula 3 Euroseries champion and renowned Frenchman Jules Bianchi has signed a long-term contract with the Ferrari Formula One team, in a contract that was gleefully described by his manager as being "undefined".
Bianchi has been busy testing for the Italian team in the current rubbish young driver test at Jerez for the last two days, setting lap times that almost threatened to register on someone's consciousness somewhere as he did so.
Ferrari have rewarded this persistent averageness with a long-term contract, though the exact role of the youngster in a team that currently employs around 35 test drivers is yet to be defined.
It does, however, mark a change in thought for the Ferrari team as to it's reserve driver situation, having declared the need for a young driver programme following the willfully embarrassing introduction of the 79-year-old Luca Badoer in place of the injured Felipe Massa for two races in the 2009 season.
"We are very happy to do this long-term deal, which was completed a short time ago," was the slightly counter-intuitive way that Bianchi's manager Nicolas Todt greeted the news a reasonable time ago.
"His role is undefined for the moment, but from now on, he will be at Ferrari's disposal. His first Ferrari drive is obviously at this young driver test."
Ferrari currently have Bianchi, Badoer, Giancarlo Fisichella and Marc Gene on the books for 2010, as well as race drivers Massa and Fernando Alonso.
Bianchi himself was understandably more than happy with the news, saying: "I am more than happy."
He added that: "It is very difficult to explain how I feel, but it is something very special.
"I know this is the first step on a journey that could turn out very nicely, but I'm equally aware that there is still a long way to go to Formula 1."
Bianchi, who will drive for the frontrunning ART team in GP2 next year, added that he was perfectly happy with the way his two day test with the Ferrari team had gone.
"We had lots of fuel [on Wednesday, when Bianchi ranked 9th], looking towards next year, so we were not fast. But it was my job to do that because the team wanted to do it," he explained.
"We did a good job I think, because we did a lot of laps without any mistakes or problems. So we finished the day with 113 laps. That's really good and I'm very happy."
He went on to say that: "The most important thing was for me to learn how to drive a Formula 1 car, because it's really different between F1 and F3 cars, and even GP2 cars. I'm just here to learn how to drive it and how to work with the team."
With a deal of some sort secured with the team, Bianchi will hand over the 2009 Ferrari at the test to an unappealing trio of Italian F3 stars for tomorrow, namely Daniel Zampieri, Marco Zipoli and Pablo Sanchez.
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