The Marussia team has confirmed that their test and replacement-driver Alexander Rossi will replace the injured Jules Bianchi for the rest of the season. However, Marussia will only race one car in the Russian Grand Prix with Max Chilton. Jules Bianchi had a dangerous crash in the Japanese GP and is still hospitalised with serious brain injury. His condition has been reported as “critical but stable”.
No reason is given why Marussia will only race with one car but the probable reasons may include the team not having enough time to properly set up the second chassis (due to Bianchi’s being damaged in the crash in Japan) to the team simply not being able to use the second chassis because of the ongoing investigation into the crash. Marussia is also in serious financial difficulty which is why the team also chose not to race their GP3 team this weekend in Russia.
Rossi will be the first American seen racing in F1s since 2007. The previous US driver was Scott Speed who drove a very lukewarm one-and-a-half season between 2006 and 2007 at Toro Rosso. Considering the condition of the team he’ll be racing, we shouldn’t expect much from Rossi’s three-race run, but I still wish him good luck none the less.
Addendum (Oct 22): Marussia decided to race only one car in a show of respect to Jules. There apparently was no technical or other reasons why they chose to race only one car.
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