Former Sauber star Zhou Guanyu could share the role of Ferrari reserve driver with Oliver Bearman and Antonio Giovinazzi for the F1 2025 season, it has been claimed.

It comes after Zhou confirmed to media including PlanetF1.com at the end of last year that he was in negotiations with the Scuderia.

Guanyu Zhou set to share Ferrari reserve role in F1 2025?

Additional reporting by Elizabeth Blackstock

Zhou and team-mate Valtteri Bottas were left without a seat for the F1 2025 season after Audi F1, who will take over the existing Sauber team next year, opted for an all-new driver lineup of Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto.

Bottas has since returned to Mercedes, where he claimed 10 F1 victories in a five-year spell between 2017 and 2021, as the team’s reserve driver for the F1 2025 season.

Meanwhile, Zhou, who became F1’s first-ever full-time Chinese driver when he made his debut in 2022, has yet to announce his next move.

Zhou confirmed rumours at the end of last year that he was in talks with Ferrari over a reserve role, with reports in Germany also linking the 25-year-old with a surprise move to Red Bull.

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Zhou is known to carry significant financial backing, with rumours last summer claiming Haas turned down an offer in excess of €30million from the driver and his sponsors in order to secure their preferred driver lineup of Ferrari junior Bearman and former Alpine man Esteban Ocon for F1 2025.

It has emerged that Zhou has another ace up his sleeve, with his recent experience of racing in F1 making him a highly attractive for teams.

A report by the Italian edition of Motorsport.com has revealed that F1 teams are increasingly paying closer attention to their choice of reserve driver, with Zhou among the few current superlicence holders without a race program in place for this year.

That has led to Zhou’s phone ‘ringing often’ over recent weeks with his lack of other commitments seeing him emerge as a tempting option.

It is said that Ferrari have ‘not excluded’ the possibility of adding Zhou to their driver roster for F1 2025 in what would likely be a shared role with Giovinazzi and Bearman.

The report claims that Ferrari’s ‘intention’ is to view Bearman, who claimed an assured seventh-place finish while standing in for an unwell Carlos Sainz at last year’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, as the team’s primary reserve driver.

That would see Bearman step up if either Lewis Hamilton or team-mate Charles Leclerc are deemed unfit to race in F1 2025, provided the news comes well in advance.

However, in the event of an emergency situation like Jeddah 2024, where Sainz’s withdrawal was only confirmed shortly before final practice, Giovinazzi would be expected to stand in at short notice.

Yet with Giovinazzi committed to competing for Ferrari in the World Endurance Championship in 2025, Ferrari may require a third reserve option to be present trackside on weekends when F1 and WEC events clash.

That figure is likely to be Zhou, who was previously a member of Ferrari’s junior academy and teased at the end of last year that “you will see me” in the paddock in F1 2025.

Speaking to media including PlanetF1.com at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, Zhou said: “Just staying in F1 [is my target].

“It would be in a reserve role, but I don’t know where to go yet. I haven’t decided which decision to make.

“We already spoke to some teams already before the [Sauber exit] announcement was released, but after the announcement a few other teams approached us, so quite a few good options I see my future with.

“But for me, I feel like I’m in a position where there’s no rush to make a decision because I need to make sure I’m in a team that can give me a chance to have a seat back [on the grid] and also in a team that I can continue to grow as a driver.

“We need to take a bit more time. It won’t be decided very [soon or in the] next months.”

Asked specifically about his links to Ferrari, he replied: “Everybody [would] love to be driving in red, especially for the race seat.

“For the reserve [role], they show some interest so we are discussing it. There’s other options as well, so there’s no one team or the other I would prefer to join.

“I just want to make sure I’m in a team that has a good or competitive car that I can continue to learn and continue to learn for myself, from a driver’s and team perspective.

“And also [a team] trying to get me out there, doing some testing and taking the reserve role to work on the development as well.

“I would say you will see me in the paddock. Which colour, I don’t know, so I’ll leave that TBC.”

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A move to Ferrari would likely see Zhou emerge as a serious contender to join the new Cadillac F1 team, who will arrive on the grid at the start of the F1 2026 season.

Zhou’s manager, the former Marussia F1 chief executive Graeme Lowdon, was recently appointed team principal of the Cadillac F1 team, who announced a multi-year technical partnership with Ferrari last month.

Cadillac will use Ferrari engines and gearboxes from 2026, with the team expected to produce their own power unit from 2028 after getting up to speed in F1.

Zhou previously confirmed that he has no interest in racing in another category in 2025 as he aims to secure a return to an F1 seat for F1 2026, with the Chinese driver keen for some F1 test outings this year in order to remain sharp.

Put to him that he could compete in a different category next year, he told media including PlanetF1.com in Vegas: “At the moment no, because I had the offers and interest in other series.

“But at the moment, I still want to be staying here because I do feel, with a lot of rookies joining the teams, there’s a lot of opportunities that could happen for ’26 onwards, so I still want to stay here.

“It won’t be a long period that I try to stay on in a reserve role before I take another series, but I do still try to get [an F1 seat] as much as I possibly can, and hopefully waiting for a good opportunity to come back.

“Some series attract me but I just feel, at this period of my racing career, I still want to give a shot more in this paddock.

“I think it’s going to be if there’s a chance to step into the race car, by any chance, you will be the priority for the team. That’s very important.

“And, also, I think the other thing is that I would love to not just be sitting around or doing simulator.

“I would love to do some test days like a lot of teams are doing. That’s why we need to speak more into details, because obviously I don’t want to do a lot of days, but I do want to be still driving a car, because obviously I’m not doing other series, and I still want to have a body fit for racing in Formula 1.

“That’s the priority.

“The good side of things, I guess, is not a lot of experienced drivers are out of seats. There’s only a few.

“Some of them are not racing in F1 or doing something else, so I think the chances are very high for me and just hopefully I find the place I want to be and hopefully get a chance to finally come back.”

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