Reigning British F3 champion Jaime Alguersuari is set to become the youngest driver in Formula One history to start a Grand Prix, with him expected to be confirmed as a Toro Rosso driver tomorrow. Ever since he replaced Brendon Hartley as the Red Bull teams' reserve driver two weeks ago, the Spanish teenager has been touted as a replacement for the under-pressure Sébastien Bourdais, who will see his brief F1 foray come to a halt after just 18 months.

British newspaper The Guardian is reporting today that the news will be confirmed by the team tomorrow, while other sources suggest the news won't be made public until later this week, or early next week. With Sébastien Buemi in the second cockpit, the Toro Rosso line-up will be relying on input from drivers with a combined experience of only 9 races. To date, Alguersuari has yet to drive a Formula One car in anger, having never tested at an official F1 test.

With in-season testing now banned, it's understood the team took the decision to oust Bourdais in order to give Alguersuari experience in F1, with a view to giving him a seat for 2010. The news is likely to force Bourdais full-time into sportscar racing, having already competed in the Sebring 12 Hours and the Le Mans 24 Hours races this year.

After dominating Champ Cars in the United States, Bourdais arrived at Toro Rosso last year to partner Sebastian Vettel and just about clung on to his seat for 2009, being confirmed just weeks before the start of the season. However, after his sometimes impressive pace of 2008 was never replicated, Bourdais has regularly found himself being outpaced by rookie team-mate Buemi, losing the qualifying battle 7-2 and being outscored on points by 3-2.

With the Hungarian Grand Prix scheduled for July 26th, at 19 years and 125 days Alguersuari will become the youngest F1 driver in history, beating the previous record held by Australia's Mike Thackwell set at the 1980 Canadian Grand Prix by 57 days. Last year, Jaime became the youngest ever winner of the British F3 series, and currently lies in eighth place in the 2009 World Series by Renault.

Born in Barcelona, Alguersuari will join Fernando Alonso as the second Spanish driver on the grid, with the European Grand Prix at Valencia scheduled for August 23rd.