Mere hours after denying the story, Red Bull has released a statement confirming that Sebastian Vettel is staying with the world champion team for at least two more years.
Earlier on Tuesday, when Germany's
Sport Bild broke the news about the 25-year-old's contract extension for 2015, Helmut Marko told SID news agency: "I don't know where this is coming from. There's nothing new."
However, Red Bull has now issued a press release announcing that it is "happy to confirm" Vettel's signing of a new deal.
Previously, Vettel was committed only until the end of 2014, so Tuesday's news is in effect a one-year extension for 2015.
Vettel's current teammate Mark Webber only has a contract for this year.
German newspaper Welt said that Vettel's new deal will certainly include a pay increase for the German, whose current retainer of € 11 million pales in comparison to Ferrari number 1 Fernando Alonso's estimated € 28m.
Brazilian correspondent for O Estado de S.Paulo newspaper, Livio Oricchio, admitted that Tuesday's news surprised him.
"With the radical change of rules next year, I would have thought that [Vettel] would wait to see who has developed the best solutions for the complex engineering challenge," he said.
Welt
The German newspaper said Marko is referring to the recent contract extensions of Red Bull team boss, Christian Horner, as well as for 'genius' designer, Adrian Newey. (GMM)
Subbed by AJN.
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