Toro Rosso continue to be the final proving ground for Red Bull's stable of young drivers as the energy drinks company continue their search for the next Sebastian Vettel.
To that end, the latest duo under the microscope, Jean-Eric Vergne and Daniel Ricciardo, are retained for a second season and both will be looking to make strides forward after indifferent first full seasons at the top level.
Having cleared out their previous youthful, but marginally more experienced, line-up to make way for Vergne and Ricciardo, it was perhaps little surprise that Toro Rosso slipped backwards in 2012, the Italian team ultimately finishing one place (ninth) and 15 points worse off in the Constructors' Championship than 12 months previously.
Red Bull owner Dietrich Mateschitz has called on them to make "significant improvements" for 2013 - although it's unlikely that Red Bull's designated junior team will ever match their incredible feats of 2008, when a then unproven Vettel brilliantly won at a rain-drenched Monza and Toro Rosso outscored the senior Red Bull squad in the Constructors' Championship.
In truth, Mateschitz surely never originally envisaged Toro Rosso being anything other than a proving ground for the company's young driving talents when he bought the perennial back-of-the-grid Minardi team for the 2006 season to double his quota of F1 entries.
Initially, the Faenza squad benefitted from being able to run a modified version of the senior Red Bull team's car but from 2010 that rule loophole was closed and Toro Rosso had to become a constructor in their own right - and therefore design their own cars.
With the build-up of improved technical capabilities and personnel unsurprisingly taking time to bear fruit, it wasn't until 2011 that Toro Rosso moved forward again and eighth place in the standings, just behind Sauber but ahead of Williams, was a commendable achievement.
Technical Director Giorgio Ascanelli left the team after a slump in form mid-way through last season to be replaced by former Sauber man James Key and the second half of the year brought more encouraging form for Toro Rosso, with points finishes in six of the final nine rounds.
Key, and no-nonsense Team Principal Franz Tost, will be looking for that momentum to carry over into 2013 so Toro Rosso continue running closer to the midfield than the back of the pack.
