Grapevine: Chelsea Sign up for Premier1 Series

Briton Johnny Herbert hopes to line up for Chelsea in the planned new Premier1 Grand Prix motor racing series scheduled for next year.

Organisers said on Wednesday that Chelsea had signed up alongside their English soccer rivals Leeds United in a championship which aims to fuse football and motorsport with cars racing in the livery of top clubs.

"I've been a Chelsea fan all my life and this drive would be one of the options I'd look at for the future depending on my success in America where I'm racing at the moment," former Formula One driver Herbert said in a statement.

Premier1 said it had not yet entered any formal discussions with drivers for the Chelsea car.

"We see Premier1 Grand Prix as a brilliant chance to broaden our fan base, both here and abroad," said Chelsea chairman Ken Bates.

Dutch UEFA Cup champions Feyenoord Rotterdam, Portugal's Benfica and Belgium's Anderlecht have already committed to the series and Premier1 said that other leading European clubs would be announced soon.

The series was originally scheduled to start later this year but has been postponed until March 2003.

Premier1 has still to say what cars will be used after British-based Reynard, the firm originally commissioned to build them, went into receivership in March.