Caterham places F1 reserve Alexander Rossi at Greaves for Le Mans

The deal between the F1 team and Greaves means that the American driver, a frontrunner in GP2 this year with the Caterham Racing squad, will line up alongside three-time Le Mans class winner Tom Kimber-Smith and former American Le Mans Series LMPC champion Eric Lux in one of the two Greaves Zytek-Nissan Z11SNs.

Greaves team principal Tim Greaves said: "We are please to be the first LMP2 team to have the backing of an F1 team. The car will run in Caterham colours, which means British Racing Green with white and yellow.

"Alexander joining Tom and Eric means the car is full of talent. We've now got two strong driver line-ups for what will be our 50th endurance start as a team."

CATERHAM TO GO HEAD TO HEAD WITH PARTNER ALPINE

Greaves would not be drawn on whether the arrangement with Caterham could be extended to cover its campaigns in the World Endurance Championship and the European Le Mans Series over the remainder of the season.

The deal means that Caterham will be racing against Alpine, in which it took a 50 per cent stake last November, at Le Mans on June 22/23.

The historic French sportscar manufacturer is backing the Signatech team, whose ORECA-Nissan 03 has been rebranded as a Alpine A450.

Rossi has replaced amateur driver Christian Zugel in the Greaves line-up. The German has withdrawn from Le Mans for family and business reasons.

Zugel, who raced with the team last season and at this year's Sebring 12 Hours, is expected to return to the team later in the year.

The other Greaves Le Mans entry has the backing of Nissan, which has placed GT Academy winners Lucas Ordonez and Jann Mardenborough and Michael Krumm in the car.