Sebastien Bourdais's Formula One career with Toro Rosso has today officially come to an end. Bourdais's failure to realise his potential has been cited as the reason why the team have decided to release the Frenchman. Team principal Franz Tost said: "In Sebastien's second year with us, the partnership has not met our expectations. "Therefore we have decided to replace him as from the next round of the world championship, the Hungarian Grand Prix." The 30-year-old arrived in F1 in 2008 after winning four successive ChampCar titles in the United States from 2004 to 2007. However, Bourdais scored just six points from the 27 grands prix in which he competed. Last year he was overshadowed by Sebastian Vettel, who gave the Italian-based team a dream win in the Italian Grand Prix. This season, Bourdais again found himself second best to Swiss rookie Sebastien Buemi, who out-qualified his more experienced teammate seven races to two. Toro Rosso are to announce Bourdais's replacement shortly before next weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix, with rising young Spanish star Jaime Alguersuari the favourite to take up the seat. The reigning British F3 champion, a product of Red Bull's Young Driver Development programme, is set to become the youngest to race in F1. Alguersuari would take his place in the record books at the age of 19 years and 126 days, beating New Zealander Mike Thackwell's record by 57 days set in the 1980 Canadian Grand Prix. *PA Sport
