Sebastian Vettel confirmed as Red Bull driver for 2009 – try to look surprised

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Sebastian Vettel will take David Coulthard’s place at Red Bull in 2009. Anyone not see that coming?

Vettel is one of the stars of Red Bull’s young driver development programme. Dozens of aspiring young drivers have worn Red Bull colours at one stage or another in their careers. Only a handful made it into F1.

And only one – Vettel – remains with Red Bull. He has looked a likely candidate for the team for some time and tested for them earlier this year.

It’s not yet know who Toro Rosso will replace him with. We discussed several options here last week including Bruno Senna, Neel Jani, Romain Grosjean and others.

Vettel is already the youngest driver to score a point in Formula 1 – he finished eighth on his debut at Indianapolis with BMW last year.

He will partner Mark Webber. The two crossed paths in unfortunate fashion last year – Vettel took Webber out of the Japanese Grand Prix while the Australian was running second, Vettel third.

Webber’s furious reaction afterwards drew tears from Vettel. But he bounced back the following week to finish fourth in the Chinese Grand Prix – his best result to date.

Ironically, Vettel was taken out of the last Grand Prix by Coulthard on the first lap.

Read more about Sebastian Vettel: Sebastian Vettel biography

Follow the changes on the 2009 F1 driver market: 2009 F1 drivers and teams

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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18 comments on “Sebastian Vettel confirmed as Red Bull driver for 2009 – try to look surprised”

  1. Good, good…

    Let see if Vettel´s hype resist to Mark Webber, who has destroyed all his team mates in a role…

  2. “It’s not yet know who Toro Rosso will replace him with”

    Bring back S.Speed!

  3. Excellent variant for continuation of career. One day he will fight with Lewis Hamilton. I think, it will be Ferrari vs. McLaren. :)

  4. “Bring back S.Speed!”

    Bring back Yuji Ide! :)

  5. Scott Speed is telling everyone over here he wants to be in Nascar, and it sounds like Red Bull will put him in a Cup car by the end of the season. He has done well in Stock Cars. He is currently second in points in the ARCA Series and has won a Truck Race.

  6. ironically if the front runner, hence pace car, hadn’t had braked so hard to keep his tyres warm (in the wet) which according to Vettel made him crash into webber, then said front runner would be last years champion.

    oh yeah I forgot, “SHOCK” , “AWE”

  7. Terry Fabulous
    18th July 2008, 3:31

    Keith may I compliment you on your sub-editing skills.
    I laughed out loud when I read “try to look surprised”.
    And this is on top of the gut busted when i read “British Grand Prix moves to Donnigton – Really?”

  8. Terry Fabulous
    18th July 2008, 3:41

    But on a serious note, this is a great decision by Red Bull to put a massive talent in their main car.

    This is also Mark Webber’s career defining challenge, his Fisichella moment. After seeing off a range of young talents and old hands, he is paired with someone that the pundits believe is the real thing.

    Will he be shown up like Fisi did alongside Alonso, or will this springboard him into the stratosphere of the elite.

  9. Robert Mckay
    18th July 2008, 8:17

    It’s nice of them to tell us now and save us months of “Vettel to Red Bull?” rumours.

  10. Terry – you’re welcome! I’ll try to fit more in in future…

  11. Sometimes I struggle to understand the hype behind certain drivers. I’m not saying he’s not very good but merely trying to understand why he is so sought after in the pit lane as his results don’t seem to tally with the hype. Whats the edge he has that others don’t have? Frankly I just enjoy seeing all the drivers giving 100% of their best.

    a little confused and bemused.

  12. Chaz – two previous articles on Vettel that might shed some light:

    Sebastian Vettel: better than Hamilton?
    Sebastian Vettel: the driver debates

  13. Alain Prost said that LH didn’t have to learn the hard way because he was put straight into a good car, however vettel seems to be. You would of thought nowadays that tomorrow he would be at ferrari.

  14. Hype comes with pressure. I hope Vettel has the mettel ‘cos if he doesn’t the press know how to take you down.

    The one thing he has on his side though, is that he’s making steady progression, advancing from a tail-end (?) team to a midfielder. I think it allows him to learn before he is considered for Ferrari or BMW perhaps.

  15. sChUmAcHeRtHeGrEaTeStEvEr
    18th July 2008, 12:42

    a few months ago grand prix.com were reporting about rumours that vettel was going to ferrari next year.

    chaz, the hype is coming from the fact hes getting the torro rosso reguarly into the top 10 in qualifying when it really isnt a good car probably the 9th best in the field, really he should be qualifying in the mid-late teens.

    i think vettel looks very good and whenever its wet he looks like scoring a big result (when dc doesnt take him out on the 1st lap that is)

  16. I agree with shoemakingisgreat (sorry)

    the kid put his STR2-B in 9th place at Melbourne, a car that doesn’t have seamless shift.

  17. Good for Vettel and maybe for Redbull too. I am not surprised he has moved up but i am surprised that Redbull announced it so early. Maybe they realized Vettel would be snapped by some other manufacturer team if they did not give this promotion to him. Now its time to see if Vettel or Webber is as good as they are perceived to be.

    This really should have been the way they should have handled Liuzzi’s career as well. Instead, they screwed him royally.

  18. William Wilgus
    18th July 2008, 16:50

    Darn . . . who could have guessed!

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