The status of the 20-year-old Jenson Button as the youngest driver currently racing in Formula One may be usurped in next month's Hungarian Grand Prix by the Brazilian teenager Antonio Pizzonia, the leader of the British Formula Three championship.
The 19-year-old from the Amazon region of Brazil, who calls himself "jungle boy", is on the shortlist to take over the second Benetton if the team chairman Flavio Briatore drops his Austrian driver Alexander Wurz after the German Grand Prix on Sunday.
Briatore is known to be fed up with Wurz's inconsistent form and tendency to make silly driving errors, and might have dropped him already this year had it not been for a reputed £2m sponsorship package from D2-Telekom that came with the driver.
Benetton have an option on Pizzonia's services but it expires in September so it would make sense to give him a try if Wurz is dropped.
The musical chairs are not confined to the drivers. This week Peugeot announced its withdrawal from grand prix racing but has sold the rights to its troublesome V10 engine to Asia Motor Technologies, which will supply the French-built engines to Arrows for 2001 and 2002. ASM is a consortium of Asian companies headed by Hideo Morita, the eldest son of the Sony founder Akio Morita.
Peugeot's departure leaves Alain Prost's team looking for a fresh engine deal but it is hard to imagine the Frenchman envying the Arrows chairman Tom Walkinshaw his choice of engine for the 2001 season. The Peugeot V10 has been racing in formula one since 1994 and looks no closer to winning its first grand prix.
Walkinshaw nonetheless said yesterday he expected his team's performance to improve greatly after securing a deal to use the Peugeot engines in the 2001 season.
Arrows will be exclusively supplied with Peugeot engines by AMT and will use AMT V10 power units, a modification of the current Peugeot V10 engines. AMT acquired the sporting arm of Peugeot, Peugeot Sport, and will now provide a works engine to Arrows for an initial period of two years.
"We are obviously very happy with the new engine deal . . . which should enable us to improve the team greatly and for the first time with the full factory support from an engine supplier," Walkinshaw said.
Arrows said AMT would act solely as engine suppliers and would not have any shares or partnership in the company.
Meanwhile, British driver Johnny Herbert has announced that he will quit Formula One at the end of the current season to take up a drive in the Fed-Ex CART championship in the United States.
The Jaguar racer told a press conference in Frankfurt yesterday: "I decided that I will go to the American CART series next year. Obviously I've got to sign a contract for a drive, but that's what I want to do next year."
