Ex-Toro Rosso racer Jaime Alguersuari is to join Lucas di Grassi as an official test driver for Pirelli during the 2012 season, as the Italian firm enters its second year as Formula One tyre supplier. It’s the first time Pirelli will have two permanent F1 testers, after former Virgin racer Di Grassi carried out the role single-handedly last year.

Ferrari’s Felipe Massa insists he is determined to put his bad start to the 2012 season behind him after a day spent at the team’s Maranello headquarters analysing what went wrong for the Brazilian in the year’s first two Grands Prix.

Fernando Alonso may have left Malaysia victorious and leading the drivers’ championship, but Ferrari aren’t about to start resting on their laurels just yet. Although pleased with the Sepang win, team principal Stefano Domenicali is under no illusions about the F2012′s shortfall to its rivals and is determined the hard work at Maranello continues apace.

Formula One Group has launched a process to extend its current financing facilities. This will involve raising $2.27bn of new facilities with maturities in 2017/18, replacing the company’s existing $2.92bn facilities which are due to mature in 2013/14. The new facilities will provide the business with a secure, long term capital structure.

Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso may have won the Malaysian race, but arguably the happiest man in Sepang on Sunday was Sauber’s Sergio Perez.

Williams announced on Monday that their chairman Adam Parr will depart the team at the end of the week. Parr joined Williams as chief executive officer just over five years ago to assist team founder Frank Williams. “I asked Adam to join Williams at the end of 2006 to support me in the running of our team,” said Williams.

Although the quick turnaround between the Australian and Malaysian rounds precluded too many extra-curricular activities pre-Sepang, there were several worthy of mention. On Thursday, two of the grid’s French contingent, Toro Rosso’s Jean-Eric Vergne and Lotus’s Romain Grosjean, braved the Kuala Lumpur heat to play an energetic game of boules with Georgie Thompson of British F1 broadcasters Sky TV.

Given their form of late – and the fact they’ll be armed with a heavily-revised McLaren – Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton could well challenge for a one-two at this weekend’s British Grand Prix. Do it and they will become the latest in a long line of British drivers to achieve the feat. But dip into the history books to discover the last time two English team mates reigned supreme on home soil you have to delve pretty deep – all the way back to Silverstone 1958…

Prior to the start of their 2010 campaign, Renault had been all but written off by many. Their parent company had sold off a chunk of the team, the R30 looked less than convincing in pre-season testing, and their line-up included a rookie driver and a new team principal fresh to Formula One.

The UK’s Goodwood Festival of Speed always attracts a plethora of Formula One drivers and machinery, and with an impressive 2010 line-up, this year will be no different. The annual event, which this year celebrates the 60th anniversary of the FIA Formula One World Championship, takes place in the grounds of Sussex’s Goodwood House…