16-year-old Max, son of Jos Verstappen, will replace Frenchman Jean-Eric Vergne at Toro Rosso in 2015.
He will become the youngest Formula One driver in history aged just 17 years and five months, when the season is likely to begin in Australia.
Former Toro Rosso driver Jaime Alguersuari is currently the youngest driver to have started a Formula One Grand Prix aged 19 years and 125 days when he started in Hungary in 2009.
Verstappen doesn’t turn 17 until next month, where he will still be too young to drive in his own country of the Netherlands and is still two years to young to hire a car.
Despite his age he has already impressed in the European Formula 3 Championship, where he has already won 8 times.
?We are happy to welcome Max into the Toro Rosso family, It?s great to see how the Red Bull Junior Programme continues to find talented young drivers and gives them the opportunity to come into Formula 1. Toro Rosso Team Principal Franz Tost told Sky Sports.
?Bearing in mind that Scuderia Toro Rosso was created with the aim of bringing young talent from the Red Bull Junior Team into Formula 1 and to educate them, it will now be up to us to provide Max with a competitive car, which will enable him to have the best possible start to his Formula 1 career.?
Claiming that Verstappen is the latest driver to step off the Red Bull young driver conveyor belt, isn’t wholly accurate seeing as he only joined the programme earlier this month following interest from the Mercedes development programme.
He opted to join Red Bull and with a Formula One drive immediately handed to him, it’s pretty clear why.
Speaking to the BBC Verstappen said: ‘Ever since I was seven years old, Formula 1 has been my career goal, so this opportunity is truly a dream come true,’
‘We have all worked tremendously hard to reach Formula 1, With the return of the Verstappen name to F1, I hope we can relive old memories and I’m hoping to see many fans at all the circuits.’
Introducing Max Verstappen
