MOTORSPORT: Aston Martin F1 team confirmed

Formula 1 is supposed to finally get a serious Aston Martin team out of Canadian billionaire Lance Stroll's rescue of the prestige but beleaguered British marque.

But it won't be before next year because Aston's sponsorship arrangement with Red Bull Racing has a season to run.

Aston is synonymous in racing with sports cars and GTs, although it dabbled in F1 in the 1950s and has been a major sponsor of Red Bull Racing the past four years and there was talk of them combining on a power unit project.

The pair continue to develop the Valkyrie hypercar, the first of which is due to be delivered late this year.

The Aston Martin Valkyrie also is earmarked for the new era of endurance racing, ultimately in both the European-based world championship and North America.

Stroll – who has made a fortune from the Tommy Hilfiger, Polo Ralph Lauren and Michael Kors fashion brands – is leading a syndicate making an almost $A1 billion rescue of Aston Martin.

The syndicate is paying $A357 million for 16.7 per cent of the marque synonymous with movie super-spy James Bond and the company will then raise another $A623 million through the issue of new shares to Stroll and his associates.

He will become executive chairman of Aston, although existing European and Kuwaiti private equity interests are expected to retain more than half the company, which has warned of an imminent halving of its profits.

Despite a bounce in its share price on Friday after news of Stroll's move, Aston Martin has lost more than $A5 billion in value since it was floated as a public company in October 2018.

Stroll will rebrand the Racing Point F1 team – originally Jordan from 1991 until 2005, then promptly Midland, Spyker and eventually Force India before going into administration in mid-2018 – as Aston Martin Racing to increase the brand's global visibility.

"My experience of the motor industry and building highly-successful global brands will mean that, over time, we fulfil Aston Marton Lagonda's potential," Stroll said.

Stroll's F1 team uses Mercedes engines and its drivers are the billionaire's 21-year-old son, Lance, and experienced Mexican Sergio Perez.

Red Bull's junior team Toro Rosso (originally Minardi) will be renamed for this season, starting in Melbourne in mid-March, as AlphaTauri, after a Red Bull fashion brand only founded in 2016.

Last year the long-running Sauber team was renamed Alfa Romeo through its association with the Fiat/Ferrari group.

A round of the Formula E electric open-wheeler series scheduled for Chinese city Sanya on March 21 has been postponed because of the coronavirus.

Sanya is on the southern end of Hainan island.

The Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) is monitoring the coronavirus outbreak in considering whether the Chinese F1 Grand Prix should go ahead in Shanghai on April 19.

Honda has vetoed plans for Fernando Alonso to race for Andretti Autosports at the Indianapolis 500 in May.

The Japanese manufacturer has not forgotten the dual world champion's belittling of its F1 power units during his second stint at McLaren and in more recent times he has been associated with Toyota in sports car endurance racing and on the Dakar marathon rally.

Alonso came close to winning the Indy 500 at his first try before a late engine failure and last year failed to qualify in a Chevrolet-powered entry.

Andretti uses Honda power and had arranged sponsorship for an entry for the Spaniard this year, but when Honda Performance Development in the US put the idea to headquarters in Tokyo it was rejected.

His only hope of a start in the 104th Indy 500 now will depend on the availability of a Chevy-powered car – perhaps even with McLaren, which recently severed ties with him and is going Indy racing in association with Schmidt Peterson Motorsports.

Veteran sprintcar racer Jamie Veal's long quest for an Australian title finally came to fruition at Tasmania's Latrobe Speedway on Saturday night.

The meeting was threatened by rain on Friday night and Saturday afternoon but the final night's racing got the underway about 8.30 after organisers went to great efforts to prepare the dirt track.

As the clock ticked around to midnight the infield looked like a wrecker's yard with seven of the 20 cars in the final crashed.

Although Veal started from pole position he had plenty of pressure on him over the 40 laps, including racing three-wide with James McFadden and Shaun Dobson at one point.

"I've been chasing this title for a long time [since 2007]," said Veal, from Warrnambool in Victoria.

Sydneysider Marcus Dumesny was runner-up and four-time champion Kerry Madsen third.

Last year's champion, Andrew Scheurle from Toowoomba, was out in the first crash of the final on lap three.

Next year's title will be at the Perth Motorplex on February 5-6.