A German court has set a firm schedule to begin the bribery trial of Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone on April 24.
The date is the same as was tentatively proposed to the lawyers midweek, giving them time to object if it clashed with other schedules.
The timetable includes 26 hearing days - the last of them on September 16 - but does not specify when the trial will end.
Ecclestone, 83, is accused of paying a $US44 million ($A49 million) kickback in 2006 to the chief risk officer of a German bank to ensure that the Formula One business was sold to a new owner the Briton favoured.
The risk officer at bank BayernLB, Gerhard Gribkowsky, has been serving a jail term of eight and a half years for taking a bribe from Ecclestone. He was convicted by the same court in Munich that will try the motor-racing boss.
Ecclestone has repeatedly said he did nothing illegal when he gave the money to Gribkowsky.
