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Andrea Caldarelli has been announced as the junior driver for TOYOTA Racing in the 2012 FIA World Endurance Championship.
Andrea, 21, is a former member of the TOYOTA Young Driver Programme (TDP) and has previously raced in Formula Nippon and Formula 3.
The talented Italian has shown promise throughout his career and as junior driver for TOYOTA Racing he is expected to become familiar with a new discipline; endurance racing.
To assist his development, Andrea will be present at the race track during several FIA World Endurance Championship events, where he will take an active part in briefings and technical discussions.
In addition, he will take part in several sessions on the driving simulator at TOYOTA Motorsport GmbH, becoming familiar with LMP1 cars and the circuits they race on.
Andrea Caldarelli: “I am really pleased to be joining TOYOTA Racing as the junior driver and I expect to gain a lot of invaluable experience. Even though I have been racing cars since 2005, I am still only 21 so there is plenty to learn and this is another milestone in my career. I know some of the guys in the team having been part of the TDP scheme for several years so it will be fun to work together again. For a young driver like myself to work as part of such a professional and experienced team will be a big benefit and I am looking forward to learning a lot more about the challenge of endurance racing.”
So the second Toyota won’t have an All-Japanese lineup, Super GT Driver Hiroaki Ishiura is already tapped in. Hopefully they get Seiji Ara, the man has LOADS of LMP1 experience with a Le Mans overall win to boot! Plus driving with TK and Dindo, he knows what makes them tick. His experience will rub off on Ishiura and Caldarelli very nicely.
Suprised Toyota preparing junior drivers for Le Mans team. Other suprise is new V8 when they have good Super GT engine used by Rebellion, see they have a 1000 kilojoule capacity battery when limit is 500 kilojoule so it will be ready for 2014 energy formula.
Add- Don’t think Caldarelli will drive this year more prepared for future.