Photo: McLaren

Formula Regional European Championship runner-up Matteo De Palo has become the latest member of the McLaren Driver Development Programme.

The 18-year-old Italian began 2025 with a part-time FRegional Middle East campaign in which he only scored once, but his sophomore FREC campaign with Trident led to four wins, seven other podiums, three poles and a sustained title attack.

He will continue with Trident when he steps up to the FIA Formula 3 Championship next year, and this weekend he will join R-ace GP’s line-up for the FIA FRegional World Cup-awarding Macau Grand Prix and do so in McLaren colours.

“Joining the MDDP is a great honour. The team have a fantastic track record for developing talent, so I am excited to grow across all elements of being a racing driver,” said De Palo.

In the announcement of De Palo’s signing, McLaren also revealed that Brando Badoer, Martinius Stenshorne and Ugo Ugochukwu will be dropped from the MDDP at the end of 2025.

Badoer joined the MDDP as an ‘optioned driver’ in 2024, then became a fully fledged member this year. That started off well as he came fifth in FRME, but he then stepped up to FIA F3 with Prema and only came 25th in the championship.

Stenshorne was signed by McLaren in May 2024, when it was under different leadership, and he came eighth in FRME and 18th in FIA F3 that year. Although he scored irregularly in F3 with Hitech GP, he did win on his third start. The 19-year-old Norwegian remained with the team this season and was fifth in the standings with two victories.

In September he made his Formula 2 debut with Trident, and step up to the championship full-time in 2026 with Rodin Motorsport. The team has signed Badoer to its FIA F3 squad for next season.

Ugochukwu raced for Sauber’s karting team until March 2021, when Formula 1 rival McLaren signed a long-term agreement with the American that gave the team an option on his services.

He has had the team’s backing since then, coming third in British Formula 4, winning the E4 title then the Macau GP in his first three years in cars. In 2025, his fourth year in single-seaters, he has had a mixed time. There was one win en route to third in the FRME standings, then with Prema in FIA F3 he took two podiums but was only 16th in the points.

Ugochukwu will switch to Campos Racing for his sophomore FIA F3 season in 2026.

“The MDPP is pleased to welcome Matteo. He is an exciting young talent who has made great progress over the past seasons, showing adaptability, consistency and growth,” said Alessandro Alunni Bravi, head of the MDDP since this January.

“We look forward to supporting his development across driving, as well as the wider aspects of being a professional driver, within our programme pathway. We also thank Ugo, Martinius and Brando for their contribution to McLaren and wish them the best for the future.”

The post McLaren signs Matteo De Palo as an F1 junior, drops three drivers appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Brando Badoer will move to Rodin Motorsport for his sophomore FIA Formula 3 Championship campaign next year.

The 19-year-old Italian, son of 1992 International Formula 3000 champion and former Formula 1 driver Luca Badoer, switches teams after coming 25th in the standings as a rookie with Prema.

He did not finish in the top half of the field in the first seven rounds as he and Prema adapted to FIA F3’s new car, but then got three consecutive points finishes and qualified a career-best eighth before being mired in the midfield again at the finale.

“I’m super excited to be joining the Rodin F3 team for next season. I can’t wait to get it started, full push!” said Badoer.

Badoer spent two years in Formula 4, coming sixth in E4 and Italian F4’s 2023 standings with Van Amersfoort Racing and getting eight podiums across the two championships, before stepping up to Formula Regional last year.

In the European championship he came fifth with VAR, going on a run of five runner-up finishes and claiming two other podiums but never a win. Either side of that he drove for PHM Racing in FRegional Middle East’s 2024 and 2025 seasons, coming fourth in the latter campaign with a maiden single-seater victory and three other podium appearances.

“We’re delighted to welcome Brando to Rodin Motorsport for FIA F3 in 2026,” said the team’s sporting director Benn Huntingford. “He’s shown great speed and maturity, and we’re confident he’ll make a strong impact with the team.”

Badoer joined the McLaren Driver Development Programme [MDDP] in October 2023 on a one-year deal as an ‘optioned driver’, then was granted full Formula 1 junior status for this year following the end of that evaluation period.

The post Brando Badoer moves to Rodin Motorsport for 2026 FIA F3 season appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Nikola Tsolov has moved onto the podium in the results of the FIA Formula 3 sprint race at the Red Bull Ring after Ugo Ugochukwu received a post-race penalty.

Prema driver Ugochukwu had initially finished third, a career-best finish in F3, ahead of Campos Racing’s title contender Tsolov but his drive to that position included an off-track moment which stewards took note of.

Tsolov had been pressuring Ugochukwu and attempted to overtake him into turn one. While the move did not work, Ugochukwu’s defending had included running off the road at the exit and then not backing off as headed up the hill to turn two.

The incident was deemed worthy of a 10-second penalty, dropping him from third to 16th. Tsolov reduced Rafael Camara’s championship lead to 17 points by inheriting a fifth podium finish of the season, and Prema’s Noel Leon earned a point by moving up into the top 10.

Ugochukwu was also reprimanded for heading to the support paddock post-race rather heading to the pitlane for the podium ceremony, and team-mate Brando Badoer got a 10s penalty and two penalty points for contact with Trident’s Charlie Wurz at turn three. That had no impact on his position as the last finisher.

One place ahead of him in 23rd was MP Motorsport’s Bruno del Pino, and he got the same set of penalties for making contact with AIX Racing’s Brad Benavides at the same corner.

DAMS’ Christian Ho was also handed a 10s penalty, for contact with ART Grand Prix’s Tuukka Taponen at turn three on lap two of the race, but since he was a non-finisher that has been converted into a five-place grid penalty for the feature race. He will now start Sunday’s race from 28th place, and has two penalty points on his race license.

Ho’s debuting team-mate Nikita Johnson was reprimanded for crossing the white line at the pit entry while mistakenly entering the pitlane, and AIX Racing’s James Hedley was disqualified from 20th place having “entered parc ferme unsupervised and without seeking authorisation by officials”.

In Formula 2, DAMS got a warning for not intervening when marshals wheeled Jak Crawford’s car off the grid. He was unable to start the formation lap and was pushed into the pits, and once there it was noted by the stewards that it was in a hazardous position since his rear-left wheel was protuding into the fast lane. The issue was not rectified by DAMS, although the stewards did not say if any team personnel were physically in a position to do so.

Their other car, driven by Kush Maini, got a five-second penalty and a penalty point for failing to stay above the minimum delta time in two consecutive sectors during a safety car period. He finished two laps down in 17th.

MP’s Oliver Goethe got two penalty points for an incident in which he was handed a time penalty during the race.

The post Tsolov inherits podium as Ugochukwu penalised for defence against him appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: FRME

PHM Racing’s Brando Badoer claimed his maiden Formula Regional Middle East victory in the reversed-grid race on Yas Marina Circuit’s Corkscrew layout.

The result lifted him up to third in the standings, with the two drivers ahead both suffering bad starts to their day.

Mumbai Falcons’ Freddie Slater suffered from a lack of pace in the race’s second half and finished a distant sixth, while ART Grand Prix’s Evan Giltaire failed to even make the start due to a mechanical problem.

Badoer rocketed away from pole and was never challenged in the 16-lap race, winning by four-and-a-half seconds.

R-ace GP’s Jin Nakamura also started fast and leapt from fifth to second, with Sainteloc Racing’s Thoephile Nael being demoted to third. He dived down Nakamura’s inside at the final chicane to reclaim second, by which point Badoer was already 1.5s clear.

Nakamura’s team-mate Ugo Ugochukwu then attacked him into turn one on lap two, and they both went off at the hotel section after almost colliding. That gave Nael a gap in second, and Mumbai Falcons’ Jack Beeton got between the R-ace pair with Nakamura now behind.

At that point Rashid Al Dhaheri was having to defend sixth place from team-mate Slater, but the pressure did not continue.

In fact, as lap three began ART Grand Prix’s Taito Kato attempted a move on both. Al Dhaheri chose to defend against Kato, and it worked, with the Japanese racer then clearing Slater a few corners later.

The safety car was then called out, as Sainteloc’s Lorenzo Castillo retired in the run-off area. Badoer led the field back to racing speed on lap six, and Slater almost succeeded in passing Kato around the outside at turn one but then drifted wide so did not get it completed.

Kato made a similar error later on in the lap, but he had broken his front wing and soon had to pit. That left Slater under attack from team-mate Reza Seewooruthun and R-ace’s Enzo Deligny next, with the latter attempting to pass at the final chicane but locking up.

Pinnacle Motorsport’s Jesse Carrasquedo Jr joined in, and when Deligny switched his attention to him it gave the Mumbai Falcons drivers some breathing room. They then both gained a spot as Nakamura dropped down to eighth, and he was soon fighting with Deligny.

Carrasquedo attempted to go around the outside of the latter at the chicane on lap 10 but ended up passing off-track, and he managed to give back the place without ART GP’s Kanato Le also getting ahead.

Carrasquedo finally broke Deligny’s defences at the end, while was successful in keeping Seewooruthun behind and grew his points lead in Giltaire’s absence.

A provisional race result was not issued until several hours after the finish.

Race results (16 laps)

The post Badoer claims first FRegional Middle East win as title fight takes a twist appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Mclaren junior Brando Badoer will warm up for his maiden FIA Formula 3 Championship campaign with a return to Formula Regional Middle East.

He will reunite with PHM Racing, the team he drove for in FRME last year when he came 10th in the standings with three podiums, before stepping up to F3 with Prema.

The 18-year-old Italian is going into his fourth year in single-seaters, and has been promoted from being an ‘optioned driver’ of the McLaren Driver Development Programme to being a full member for 2025 despite still chasing a first race win.

“Very exited to get back behind the wheel in FRME with PHM Racing. I am already familiar with the team after joining them for the past FRME season and I can’t wait to be back at working together very soon. Let’s push!” said Badoer.

He spent his first two years of car racing in Formula 4, and came sixth in the Italian, Euro 4 and United Arab Emirates championships in 2023. His maiden podium came in the last of those three, as it occurred at the start of the year, three more followed in Euro 4 (now known as E4) and in Italian F4 there were five podiums and a pole position.

Badoer drove for Van Amersfoort Racing that year, and was in its FRegional European Championship line-up for 2024. In that campaign he followed up his three FRME podiums with a run of five runner-up finishes in a row and a pole in the first half of the season. He dropped from third to fifth in the standings after that, as two third places were among only five points finishes in the remaining races.

The post New McLaren junior Badoer to warm up for F3 with return to FRME appeared first on Formula Scout.

30. Lochie Hughes

New entry • USF Pro 2000 title run earned scholarship for Andretti Indy Nxt ride

Photo: Gavin Baker Photography

Photo: Gavin Baker Photography

The 22-year-old Hughes used maturity and consistency to become the 2024 USF Pro 2000 champion with Turn 3 Motorsport. And while he did take two poles, a win and a second place in the opening round, that didn’t actually set up his title charge.

At NOLA Motorsports Park he only had one top-10 finish from three races, and the winning form of Nikita Johnson and Hunter Yeany stole the headlines. But Hughes then went on a seven-race run of podiums, including winning all three races at Road America and making the podium in the Freedom 90 oval race which awarded additional points.

Yeany had dropped off the grid by then, and Hughes was now points leader by a big margin. Therefore he just had to be competitive and clean in the remaining rounds to ensure he became champion.

A fourth and a seventh place at Mid-Ohio was followed by a fifth place and a win on the streets of Toronto, where being mistake-free proved critical for strong results and was where Johnson fell short.

To round out the season, Hughes finished sixth and second in the two races at Portland and earned himself a scholarship to step up to Indy Nxt in 2025. He will make the move with the Andretti Global team.

Although Johnson won more races than Hughes, it was the latter who had the highest average starting and finishing position over the course of the season and made him a deserving champion.

29. Mattia Colnaghi

New entry • Car racing rookie snatched Spanish F4 crown

Photo: Spanish F4

Photo: Spanish F4

Colnaghi earned his seat in Spanish F4 with MP Motorsport by winning the Richard Mille Young Talent Academy shootout in 2023.

To warm up for the championship, which had an average grid size of 35 cars this year, Colnaghi got some crucial first racing miles in by doing the first two rounds of Spain’s Formula Winter Series for F4 cars. Two seventh places were his best results, and it put him 18th in the standings.

Those two circuits, Jerez and Barcelona, did not appear on the Spanish F4 schedule until the end of the campaign and so Colnaghi still had a lot of learning to do through most of 2024.

But in round one at Jarama he claimed a pole position, made the podium at Algarve next time out, then turned two poles into two dominant wins at Paul Ricard. He finished fifth in race three, and was now the main rival to team-mate Keanu Al Azhari in the standings but over 40 points behind.

They were both outshone by Maciej Gladysz at Motorland Aragon, then by Juan Cota at Valencia’s Ricardo Tormo circuit, but Colnaghi’s two podiums at the latter venue reduced the points gap. Then came the two tracks Colnaghi had already raced on, and the difference that made was remarkable.

At Jerez he took two wins and a third place to reduce the gap to Al Azhari to 13 points. Then pole and another two wins at Barcelona meant he snatched the lead ahead of the decisive race. He finished it behind his rival, but did enough to deny him the title and be the top rookie in the field by almost 100 points.

Colnaghi then made his Formula Regional debut with MP in the Macau Grand Prix, qualifying 14th and taking that position in the main race too despite crashing.

28. Jak Crawford

Re-entry • Sophomore was stronger in F2 with racey DAMS package

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Crawford scored more than twice as many points in his sophomore Formula 2 season than he did as a rookie, and jumped from 13th to fifth in the standings.

The key difference with his 2024 campaign was he switched his reliance for points from sprint races to feature races, but was only half a point off being the joint-highest scorer in the former still.

There were no pole positions, unlike in 2023, as Crawford underperformed in qualifying (being the 15th fastest driver on absolute pace across the season) but usually made up for it in races and only suffered one retirement before the final two rounds in the Middle East. Only one driver had finished more races than him up to that point.

Crawford’s sole win of the year came in the Barcelona feature race, which he started from second place on the grid, and that was one of three races he led. The 19-year-old was actually rarely at the front, but the set-up direction at DAMS gave him a car with some of the best race pace in the field.

This was clear at Silverstone, where he came from seventh on the grid to win the feature race on the road before a penalty for an unsafe release from his pit-stop demoted him to third. He called it “one of the best races I’ve had” and it was one of 20 races this year out of 28 where he retained or moved up from his starting position in the race.

That he started seven races from 20th or lower though explains why he can’t feature any higher in this ranking, even taking DAMS’ race-favouring set-ups into account.

27. Alessandro Giusti

Up 7 • Williams junior was a winner again in FREC

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Having moved to ART Grand Prix from G4 Racing, where he had won three times as a rookie in 2023, much was expected of Giusti in his sophomore year in Formula Regional Europe. The French team was looking to return to its previous successes, having endured a torrid 2023.

Ahead of the season, Giusti was signed up by the Williams Driver Academy which provided additional support both on and off track.

As Rafael Camara hit the ground running to build up an unassailable points lead, it took Giusti some time to find his feet, with team-mate Evan Giltaire looking ready to usurp his predecessor as French F4 champion.

Giusti scored two podiums at Zandvoort but it wasn’t until the last race before the summer break, on home ground at Paul Ricard, that his season really took off.

He was superb in wet conditions in the south of France, scene of his maiden triumph a year earlier, passing Camara for the lead and sailing to victory. He followed it up with a second win, again in the rain, at Imola as he closed the points gap to the top three.

Unfortunately, a red flag in the Monza finale curtailed his chase of leader Camara and prevented him overhauling Taponen for third in the standings.

Ultimately, fourth was a disappointing outcome for a race-winning sophomore in a field largely comprising category rookies. Nevertheless, his pace is clear, and his 2024 results underlined his wet weather car control. He moves up to FIA Formula 3 with MP Motorsport with the potential to win races.

26. Caio Collet

Re-entry • F3 stalwart established himself well in Indy Nxt

Photo: Travis Hinkle

Photo: Justin Walsh

Following three wins from three seasons in FIA F3, Collet stepped up to single-seaters’ second tier by moving to Indy Nxt with HMD Motorsports.

In the same way that the champion had a big margin to second place, who in turn had a big margin to Collet, the Brazilian too was comfortably better than anyone else over the course of the campaign. He secured third in the standings, and rookie-of-the-year honours, by 104 points as his nearest rival scored only three quarters of the points that he did.

Like most drivers coming over from the European racing scene, Collet had no oval experience to cite before he raced on one for the first time in Indy Nxt and his inexperience of those circuits and that type of racing showed. However there was a clear improvement curve, as with his season as a whole, and he concluded the year at Nashville Superspeedway with a third place.

The highlight was undoubtedly Mid-Ohio though, where he converted his maiden pole into a lights-to-flag win, accompanied by the point for fastest lap too. He did take a fastest lap at Iowa Speedway too, but in somewhat unique circumstances since he crashed out early and the pace in the tow was at its highest in the laps before tyre blistering became a concern.

Collet will remain with HMD in Indy Nxt for 2025, and have the same engineer. One track he already has extra experience of is Portland, as his role as Nissan’s reserve driver in Formula E led to him being called up for the championship’s races there this June.

25. Brando Badoer

New entry • String of FREC podiums led to full faith of McLaren

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Badoer stood on the Formula Regional Europe podium seven times, but somehow failed to ever reach the top step. He was a model of consistency, regularly challenging at the front but never quite able to clock up a maiden win – not just in FREC but since he started racing cars in 2022.

Tenth place in Formula Regional Middle East for PHM Racing gave little indication of his potential but back in the fold at Van Amersfoort Racing, his European home since graduating from karts, he gained in confidence, leading the team’s strong all-rookie line-up.

He scored points in 15 of 20 races, including five consecutive second-places mid-season, to take fifth in the standings.

His single lap pace was strong too, beaten only by series benchmark Rafael Camara in season average qualifying times, and taking a maiden pole at Mugello.

Clearly, his performances had done enough to impress McLaren, which exercised the option it signed on him last year to make him a full member of its driver development programme, and Prema, which has recruited him to its FIA F3 squad for 2025 as he moves away from VAR. Surely a first win in single-seaters can’t be too far off.

24. Richard Verschoor

Up 9 • F2 veteran enjoyed his best season yet

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

This may have been Verschoor’s fourth F2 season, and he was only eighth in the standings, but it was also his best and without two disqualifications he would have made the top five in the points.

He led more laps than anyone else in 2024, had the fifth highest feature race points tally and would have matched the champion’s haul of eight podiums from the year had he not been stripped of his sprint race victory at Jeddah for using an “incorrect throttle pedal progressivity map” and being removed from the results of the Hungaroring sprint race due to having a rear plank “below the minimum thickness required” after finishing first on the road.

Verschoor didn’t lose faith in his Trident team’s ability with the championship’s new Dallara F2 2024 car, and they finally took a win that counted in Baku as Verschoor took pole and was victorious in the feature race. However the opportunity to switch to MP for the final two rounds then arose, and the Dutchman snapped it up as quickly as he could.

The outcome from that decision was two podiums and two fastest laps from the final four races, and rising up the points table. He quickly committed to a full-season deal for 2025 with the team too, with his head currently held very high.

23. Oliver Goethe

Re-entry • F2 and Macau cameos made up for any F3 disappointment

Photo: Red Bull

Photo: Red Bull

Goethe was one of several drivers this year who used appearances in F2 to boost their profile after not quite hitting targets in their primary programme.

For the Red Bull junior it was FIA F3 where he spent most of his time, contesting all but the final round and scoring 94 points to come seventh in the standings with Campos Racing.

He charged to victory in the Imola sprint race then to second in the feature, setting the fastest lap in both, and he also made the podium in the Barcelona sprint race during a 12-race scoring run. While consistency delivered the title to former team-mate Leonardo Fornaroli, it didn’t reap the same rewards for Goethe (who had the next highest average finishing position) and once he saw an opportunity to race in F2 – when friend Franco Colapinto stepped up to Formula 1 – he took it with both hands.

Although he failed to score in his first five races, he netted 14 points from the final three – including fourth place in the Lusail feature race – to leap to 23rd in the standings and he was the 14th fastest driver in the field on average race pace in a competitive MP Motorsport-run car.

Goethe also made a FRegional cameo with MP in the Macau Grand Prix, and it was another profile-boosting outing since he qualified second (just 0.014s shy of pole) then was runner-up in the qualification and main races. He will remain with MP for 2025 as he embarks on a full F2 campaign.

22. Christian Mansell

New entry • Stepped up to be F3 title outsider with ART

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd

The teenaged Mansell began 2024 by stepping down from F3 to FRegional to contest the New Zealand-based Oceania championship. He only did two rounds, but still came away with a win, three second places, two poles and ninth in the standings.

Upon his return to single-seater’s third tier, where he has been racing since 2021, he did not have any high-impact performances – extending his win-free streak at that level to 56 races – but was methodological in maximising the pace of the package ART Grand Prix provided him with.

In this instance, it means Mansell was often a beneficiary of reversed grids yet also made the feature race podium four times – a figure only the win-free champion bettered.

Mansell’s average starting position was 8.9, but that was the fifth best in the field and he converted it into the third-largest feature race points haul in the field with 95 of his 112 points coming on Sundays. Pole position at Barcelona earned him an extra two as well.

Following the conclusion of the season, Mansell stepped up to F2 with Trident and adapted quickly to the higher level. From a sample size of three rounds and at three tracks that were new to him, he had the ninth best race pace in the field but was 27th on single-lap pace. He also led six laps, compared to 11 across the whole FIA F3 season, and scored in half of the races he contested. Unsurprisingly he will make the move to F2 full-time in 2025, driving for Rodin Motorsport.

21. Jacob Abel

New entry • Became Indy Nxt race-winner and title challenger in third year

Photo: Karl Zemlin

Photo: Karl Zemlin

Abel’s impressive Indy Nxt season existed in the shadow of the champion’s utterly sublime one, but he was a step ahead of the rest of the pack so comfortably claimed the championship runner-up spot.

In the first three rounds (encompassing four races) he took two wins, two second places and three poles, which comfortably made him points leader. Although he only took one more win following that, there were six other podium finishes, no retirements and only two days in which he finished outside of the top 10.

Abel also did well in wheel-to-wheel battles, with a calm style that was predictable but often wasn’t picked up on by rivals. What proved costly was falling behind his rival Louis Foster in qualifying, particularly on the ovals where he started and finished behind at every single one.

But consistently being on the podium meant he ended the year 81 points clear of third in the standings, and having proven he can master the Indy Nxt car in his third season it’s now a question of whether he needs a fourth campaign or find a place in IndyCar to speed up his development curve on ovals. Next season the top-tier series races on five, and its support series visits four.

The post Formula Scout Top 50 Drivers of 2024: 30-21 appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Prema

Brando Badoer has earned full McLaren Formula 1 junior status for 2025, as well as a FIA Formula 3 Championship seat at Prema.

The 18-year-old son of ex-F1 driver Luca was signed to the McLaren Driver Development Programme [MDDP] a year ago on a one-year deal to be an ‘optioned driver’. The team did not say what that entailed, but Badoer had “the potential to sign to the [MDDP] full-time at the end of his evaluation” and that has now occurred.

“I am excited to join the MDDP. It’s a fantastic opportunity to join a team with such a great racing heritage and a proven record for developing talent,” said Badoer.

McLaren’s F1 business operations director Stephanie Carlin said Badoer had “impressed with his performances as a rookie in the competitive Formula Regional [European] Championship” this year, prompting the decision to make him an F1 junior.

Badoer started 2024 in FRegional Middle East, coming 10th in the standings with three podiums. He is currently fifth in the FREC standings, having made the podium seven times, and is in contention to be championship runner-up.

“Competing in the 2025 FIA F3 Championship with Prema will help continue my progression and I’d like to thank the whole team at McLaren for their support. I can’t wait to learn from the team’s guidance and get racing in the team’s iconic colours,” added Badoer.

Prema’s team principal Rene Rosin called Badoer “a very interesting prospect” after signing him.

“We are delighted to give him an opportunity for 2025. We have kept an eye on him because we noticed his potential from F4 to FREC, and we saw him make an impressive step this season. F3 will be challenging, as it usually is, but he has the right attitude to quickly gel with the team and series.”

The post Badoer earns full McLaren junior status and Prema seat in F3 appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Van Amersfoort Racing’s Brando Badoer was fastest in pre-event testing for the Formula Regional European Championship round at Imola.

The day was split into two 50-minute sessions, and ART Grand Prix’s Alessandro Giusti topped the first with a 1m40.333s lap. He beat R-ace GP’s Tuukka Taponen to top spot by 0.05 seconds, with Prema’s Rafael Camara 0.171s behind in third.

Pedro Clerot was fourth for VAR, 0.186s off the fastest lap, and Sainteloc Racing’s Theophile Nael was 0.236s slower than Giusti in fifth. By the end of the session, the top 21 were spread by less than a second on pace.

Nael initially led the way when the first representative laptimes were set, with team-mate Matteo de Palo the first driver to lap sub-1m43s. Giusti then lowered the pace twice before Zachary David and team-mate Taponen took turns at the top.

Giusti moved back ahead with a 1m41.278s, then Badoer got involved at the top and had a long-standing 1m40.898s benchmark. It took 22 minutes before somebody beat it, with Camara edging ahead by 0.038s.

That was immediately beaten by a 1m40.766s from Giusti, with Wharton and Taponen also briefly holding first place two minutes later before Giusti crossed the line with a 1m40.333s.

The fight to be quickest in session two was primarily between Badoer and Camara, repeatedly trading fastest laps before Badoer set a 1m40.077s that put him ahead of his rival by 0.04s and could not be beaten.

His team-mates Ivan Domingues and Clerot were just 0.065s and 0.073s slower than him, and Giusti completed a top five covered by 0.098s.

Trident’s Roman Bilinski was 18th fastest overall on his return to the cockpit, having missed several rounds after breaking his back earlier in the season.

The only drivers not to set personal bests in session two were Taponen, who was still sixth fastest overall, Enzo Peugeot (Sainteloc), Enzo Deligny (R-ace), Doriane Pin (Iron Dames) and Niko Lacorte (Trident).

Test results

The post Badoer tops FREC pre-event testing at Imola as 0.098s covers top five appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

After initially looking unstoppable, Rafael Camara’s Formula Regional Europe points lead has been pared back. Formula Scout spoke to title contenders and team managers before their summer break

Prema’s Rafael Camara sprinted out of the starting blocks to dominate the first three rounds of the Formula Regional European Championship season, taking four wins and two second places to establish a commanding 73-point lead.

Despite losing some of his advantage in the following three rounds before the summer break as other teams upped their pace, a fifth win at Paul Ricard leaves him still 50 points clear of fellow Ferrari junior Tuukka Taponen, with eight races to go.

Camara is justifiably content with the “very good job [we did] for the first half”, which he attributes to “all the hard work we did in the pre-season and from a positive season last year”.

“I think we worked well as a team and with the car to make sure that we were straight as competitive as possible when we started the season,” he told Formula Scout.

“After that, while the last three races were a bit trickier, we have always been fighting for pole positions and podiums. We just kept our heads down, kept working and now we can enjoy a bit of holidays. We have to come back with the same focus and start the second half with the same attitude [but] I think that’s the same for everyone.”

Prema team principal Rene Rosin has long been a fan of Camara’s, extolling the “amazing job” he is doing this year.

“Since I’ve known Rafa from karting he’s always been extremely fast, extremely competitive. He was the only one fighting with [Andrea Kimi] Antonelli in all the categories he has done,” he said.

“For the first time in his career, he’s repeating his season because it’s something that we discussed quite a lot with Ferrari. We need to make sure that he’s capable of winning, that we know that the experience will help him in the future.”

Photo: FRECA

Camara has contributed almost two thirds of Prema’s 325 points, as team-mates James Wharton and Ugo Ugochukwu have struggled to match the Brazilian’s consistency.

The spread of Prema’s racing activities ensures Rosin is adept at multitasking, often sitting on the pitwall with “the phone with the FRegional and the big screen for Formula 3, Formula 2”.

He says he is “really happy generally about the team, how it’s going, because I have to say even James Wharton is doing a very good job considering the step from F4 to FREC”.

In Wharton’s case, as he recently explained in an in-depth interview with Formula Scout, pace has not been the biggest issue as driver errors and technical issues have taken some of the shine off a strong rookie season.

McLaren junior Ugochukwu has been unable to match his team-mates but as Rosin explains: “Ugo is a bit of an innocent case of the situation at the moment. We ran into some issues that that have compromised his performance and prevented him from showing his full competitive level. We are working very hard to try and solve these issues, that are not coming from our side or his mistakes.

“I’m really sorry for him, because he really deserves to do a very good job but I’m sure that to the end of the season, he will progress as much as possible because honestly he’s also doing a very good season.”

Rosin was reluctant to elaborate on these “issues”, but the team was forced to fit a third engine during practice in Paul Ricard, exceeding the two-engine limit for the entire season.

A provisional penalty of disqualification from the event was suspended, allowing Ugochukwu to compete in France, since “the technical delegate [was] not able to clearly and immediately determine the cause of the possible dysfunction […] of the first two engines”.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

If subsequent analysis determines that either of the initial two engines did not fail, the disqualification will be applied retrospectively, and the team will be required to re-fit one of the original engines.

As in 2023, the closest challenge to Prema has come from R-ace GP, whose lead driver is Prema’s former F4 star Taponen. He had a run of four wins from five races, including a brace at the Hungaroring.

“We improved as a team quite a lot, already a bit in Zandvoort and then in Budapest. Mugello was [another] strong weekend for us,” Taponen told Formula Scout.

“Budapest was a perfect weekend. It was dry and wet conditions, and I managed to do two poles and two race wins. We kept a good momentum to Mugello doing a pole and race win on Saturday and finishing P4 on Sunday, which was a great weekend as well.”

Although acknowledging he has improved during the season, Taponen feels he “improved the most in [FRegional Middle East], always learning a bit more”. He won the title in that championship as a category rookie.

“Here, I have improved as well in every area. The co-operation [within R-ace] has been really good. Obviously, we have had some good and bad moments inside the team as well but most of the time we are working together and trying to do the best on and off track to fight always for the wins.”

“Everything is open,” he added in reference to the title fight. “Rafa got a big advantage at the beginning of the year, but I have closed the gap quite a lot, but we definitely need to find something to fight for the wins at the end of the season.”

That need comes in part due to R-ace “struggling on high-speed tracks” since “the start of the season”.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

“Spa-Francorchamps it was difficult and again in Paul Ricard where the straights are a bit longer, we are missing a bit. The car is really good in the corners, and aero is the same for everybody more or less, but always when we go to the corners we are super quick but then we are missing a bit after. We need to find some more speed for after the holiday.”

Unlike most of his rivals, Taponen did not head straight for the beach, instead making his F3 debut with ART Grand Prix at Spa a week after Paul Ricard. He qualified 13th, one place shy of reversed-grid pole, and two tricky races left him frustrated.

For R-ace’s team principal, Thibaut de Merindol, the season so far has been one of “ups and downs”.

“[We had a] difficult start at Hockenheim. Spa was very difficult for different reasons. Car-wise we were not really good for the first events. I think we managed to assess and correct the situation from Hungaroring, [which, together with] Mugello have been, I think, very strong. Race after race, season after season, we are still scratching our heads to find the little tenth somewhere but okay, it’s never easy, you know?”

Taponen’s team-mates Zachary David and Red Bull junior Enzo Deligny have shown flashes of pace, with David’s Spa podium a highlight.

“We would like to do better with both of them,” de Merindol admits. “It’s also not a concern but for sure a source of motivation for us. We feel we can do better.”

R-ace has been kept on its toes by the resurgent Van Amersfoort Racing, which with its three rookies motivating and pushing each other has become a consistent frontrunner. The Dutch team entered the break just four points behind its French rival.

“This is good. I mean, obviously, it’s more competition [but] I think it’s good for the championship,” de Merindol says of being rivalled by VAR.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

“It’s also good for us because then we need to push ourselves. For sure, VAR did a good step forward. I think now they are really in the mix with Prema and us on every track.”

VAR’s team manager Danielle Geel agrees that a significant step forward has been made.

“We worked hard this winter to make that step, [both] with the drivers and also we had a few new people in the team. We had a lot of work to do, and I think that hard work pays off now,” she told Formula Scout. “We are not there where we want to be yet, but we are going towards the good direction.”

“We already showed good pace in Hockenheim. Especially with three rookies, it is really nice to be in the top 10. In Spa, we had a more difficult race, but in Mugello we really had a strong pace and we were dominant and then in race one [to finish] P2, P3 and P4 with three rookies, that’s a really good performance.

“We are really happy as a team and with the drivers, and it gives us even more motivation to make an extra step in the second half of the season and be as successful as we were for the first half of the season, because we are still not P1 and until you’re on that spot, you always need to work hard. Even if you are P1, you also need to work hard to be in front of your competitors.”

In three of FREC’s past seasons, VAR has ended its campaign with two victories. While it is yet to win in 2024, Geel values the overall consistency “because with this you can collect as many points, and also win a championship”.

Brando Badoer has been one of the standout performers of the season so far, being runner-up five races in a row then collecting a sixth podium straight after. His streak came to an end in an incident-filled opening to Paul Ricard race two.

Until that point, Badoer had scored points in every round. Now only Camara has. A first win, not only in FREC but in three years of racing cars, incredibly remains elusive for the 17-year-old Italian.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Neither driver nor team sense any frustration at so far having missed the podium’s top step, but Geel believes “that he’s getting more and more hungry to get that win”.

“I’m pretty sure that that the win will come this year, but we keep working until we are there,” she said.

“I’m not really frustrated, because it’s my first season,” added Badoer. “I think I’m doing a good job, and I try to work as hard as I can to get the win but let’s see what happens. If we are solid at the front then maybe sooner or later it will come.”

The title is a possibility, he argues, as he sits 77 points behind Camara with 200 left still to score: “There are still eight races left, so anything can happen. We will work race-by-race and try to do it.”

His team-mate Ivan Domingues meanwhile has been one of the season’s surprises, with a string of strong performances that put him atop FREC’s rookie standings. Pedro Clerot has lacked consistency, but enjoyed superb weekends at Spa and Mugello.

Geel is “really happy with how the guys are working with each other, making each other better and also helping each other; where the other ones have weaker points, the other ones have stronger points”.

From outside, the drivers give the impression of forming a cohesive and co-operative team as well as a quick one. Geel also sees that.

“Ivan and Brando knew each other already when they were racing in F4 with us. Pedro was new to the team, but also he is a really good person to have in the team. They all have different characters but that works really fine together. It’s really nice to see.”

ART GP has bounced back from a winless 2023 to take victories with Evan Giltaire and Alessandro Giusti.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Williams junior Giusti came into his sophomore season as one of the title favourites but struggled to get everything together until he stormed to victory in the rain at Paul Ricard to enter the summer break on a high.

The modest Giltaire has been an equal for his more experienced team-mate and predecessor as French F4 champion, winning first time out at Hockenheim, and is highly rated in the paddock.

“Hockenheim was a different weekend to the others. We won a race, but it wasn’t really the performance that we have had the whole season. I have been really working on myself and in this hard category to understand the tyres, the weight of the car, everything,” Giltaire reflects.

“It’s not looking really good at the moment, but I continue to progress, so I am happy about the work we do with the team.

“I did a lot of mistakes in my quali laps in the two or three last meetings, but when I’m fully 100% well in the car and made no mistakes I’m close to Sandro [Giusti] who has a lot of experience compared to me. I have progressed a lot compared to him so I’m happy with my progress.

“Race pace is a bit more tricky than qualifying. I have a lot of problems with degradation but in the battles like [race one at Paul Ricard], where I started 12th and finished eighth, it was a good first half of the race but in the end the degradation caught me [out] and it was a bit tricky at the end but I’m happy with my races.

“I will be stronger after the summer break surely,” he concludes with a smile.

For Italo-Irish team Race Performance Motorsport the season so far has been a frustrating one, with team principal Keith Donegan admitting that it has been at a loss to explain team leader Noah Stromsted’s lack of pace.

Photo: FRECA

The Dane has nevertheless scored all 61 of R-P-M’s points, including a second and a fourth at Spa, then another podium at Paul Ricard. Rookie Edgar Pierre and sophomore Giovanni Maschio have struggled for pace in the team’s other cars.

Trident came into 2024 with high hopes of a title challenge with third-year driver Roman Bilinski. After taking a second at Spa, the British-Pole broke two vertebrae in a road accident, putting him out of action for the four rounds since.

Bilinski had hoped to make a comeback at Mugello but was ruled out by the circuit’s doctors. But he has time to recover before the next round at Imola in September.

“It’s a shame that he had to stop in that moment. He had his accident, and it was in a perfect moment of his season because he did the pole in Spa. He was quite competitive, and he was really excited to go to Zandvoort, which is a quite complicated track, and then Budapest where historically, he was always fast,” dwelled Trident’s team manager Luca Zerbini.

Bilinski had been expected not only to lead the team but help develop his rookie team-mates “because to keep a driver on for his third year, that already knows the team very well, it was a very good help for the other two drivers [Alpine junior Nicola Lacorte and Ruiqi Liu] because even though they are very good, they are rookies.”

After running just two cars at Zandvoort, Michael Belov was drafted in for yet another FRegional return in Hungary.

As he explained to Formula Scout, his career has been frustrated by budget and geopolitical factors, and if his Paul Ricard appearance is his last, he could at least make his mark after topping his qualifying group on both days. He held on to his starting spot to be race one runner-up, before being eliminated by Badoer in race two.

“Michael is a really, really good driver and he’s helping the team now, but also for him was not very, very easy to jump in a car. He had not been driving for months, but he is doing a very good job, so hopefully from now we will get the pace back,” Zerbini told Formula Scout.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Both rookies have made progress, each scoring three points. Expectations were perhaps higher for Lacorte, given his race-winning F4 form, but Zerbini has been particularly impressed by Liu’s improvement.

“[It] was quite a surprise because Nicola was more competitive last year in F4, so it was not a big surprise if he’s able to get the result, but for Ruiqi that was struggling more last year, to see him that constantly now in the top half of the classification [is positive]. They’re improving and growing and at the end of the day, this is our aim to help them to grow. So, we are happy.”

Sainteloc Racing opted for an all-rookie line-up, but an exciting one, headed by Spanish F4 champion Theophile Nael. However French F4 runner-up Enzo Peugeot has often looked the most impressive, scoring in every race at Spa and Zandvoort.

The team’s managing director Morgan Caron reflected on 2024 while chatting to Formula Scout in the Paul Ricard paddock.

“It’s a challenging championship, very competitive once again and on our side basically we have shown good performances. We have three rookies, [which] was a bet on our side honestly, [who] are doing well. A special highlight [has been] Peugeot, honestly, he is the one performing the best from the team. Hopefully we can confirm the pace by making a proper pole position, a podium and a victory.”

“They are all progressing, for sure. There are many areas where they still need to improve but it’s a feeder series. They are there to learn but we are convinced the three rookies can finish the season on the rise.”

Two other teams have scored: MP Motorsport and G4 Racing. Nikita Bedrin has scored all but one of MP’s points but was forced to miss the Hungaroring round due to a calendar clash with his FIA F3 programme for AIX Racing.

After his strong results in a season-end cameo in 2023, Bedrin had been expected to challenge for the title but, in truth, has yet to look like a potential race-winner, admitting to Formula Scout that “switching every time from F3 to FREC is kind of difficult”.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Nikhil Bohra has so far not come close to matching his 2023 results with Trident, and Valerio Rinicella is yet to score.

G4 also runs three rookies, and, perhaps unsurprisingly, is yet to match the peaks of its impressive 2023 with Giusti and Belov. The team manager Adrian Munoz acknowledges the steep learning curve for rookies, particularly on some of the circuits in the season’s first half like Hockenheim and the Hungaroring where opportunities to learn the track are more limited.

“So far, we are happy with our drivers. They have been learning, they are making good steps up. But FREC is every single year quite competitive,” he says. Kanato Le’s fourth place in France gives G4 encouragement for after the summer break.

“Race-by-race we are progressing and understanding where we are, and we keep evaluating where we are at every event and trying to improve for the next one.”

Munoz adds: “[The key with rookies] is trying to manage the expectations because many times when they do well in F4 and they come to FREC in the beginning they think like, ‘okay, this is just a little bit bigger car’. But in the end it’s quite big step – way more powerful engine, bigger tyres and the competition is fierce because there are drivers that are coming from the previous year, other drivers who did F3, [FRegional in the] Emirates or the New Zealand championship.

“Last year with us Alessandro Giusti was improving more from the middle of the season to the end, when he really got more used to the procedures, to the car, to the tyres, to the circuits, coming from a championship like F4 France.

“The three rookie drivers in VAR are coming up very quickly and we aim that in the second part of the year, our rookie drivers will make continuous steps to try to get better results. For me, we were expecting to be on a learning curve, so that hopefully [when] we speak again in Monza, we can see already the progress.”

KIC Motorsport has been co-operating with Evans GP this year, although has so far rotated three different drivers alongside regulars Nandhavud Bhirombhakdi and Hoang Dat ‘Alex’ Sawer.

Photo: Iron Dames

FREC’s newest team, Iron Dames, came from sportscars and has attracted plenty of publicity for its all-female line-up of F1 Academy champion Marta Garcia and Mercedes-AMG Formula 1 junior Doriane Pin who took the squad’s best result of 14th at Paul Ricard after missing five races through a combination of fractured ribs and a clash with her F1 Academy campaign.

While rivals have muttered misgivings about a sister team to Prema being given an entry, the team itself has done the maximum to ensure that the two teams are run at arm’s length from each other. And the added media attention has undoubtedly been a massive benefit to FREC’s public profile.

While some of the extreme expectations expressed on social media have been fantastic, the two drivers seem to have kept their feet on the ground, and have been making strong progress, with both looking more comfortable in qualifying at Paul Ricard. And with Iron Dames bringing the field up to 32 cars, the loss of Monolite Racing and Arden in 2024 hasn’t been felt.

“There are not anymore some teams [without a] budget or enough tools,” notes Munoz. “Nowadays, everyone is going to the simulator and there is a lot of simulation tools for the teams. The level is quite good and any single mistake in quali condemns you to be in the back and then you need to really make your way back to the front so I would say that that the championship is in a pretty good situation.”

The post Can anyone catch Camara after FREC’s summer break? appeared first on Formula Scout.

Photo: Dutch Photo Agency

Van Amersfoort Racing’s Brando Badoer set the fastest times in both of Formula Regional Europe’s practice sessions at Paul Ricard.

However, ultimately just 0.006 seconds separated the top three, with Prema’s Rafael Camara and James Wharton almost matching Badoer’s 1m59.050s FP2 benchmark as all drivers, except Lena Buhler, bettered their FP1 times.

Michael Belov, still deputising for Roman Bilinski at Trident, was on the pace throughout the day and ended it fourth fastest overall, with VAR’s Ivan Domingues in fifth.

Badoer’s gap over his rivals was much greater in the cooler morning session, as he outpaced Camara by over half a second and set three laps that each would have been good enough to top the timesheet.

The Trident trio of Ruiqi Liu, Belov and Niko Lacorte set the early pace, before ART Grand Prix’s Alessandro Giusti and Evan Giltaire moved to the front.

However, R-ace GP’s Enzo Deligny was the first driver to dip below 2m01s with a 2m00.971s set 13 minutes in.

With 30 minutes remaining, Badoer jumped to the top, and despite being pushed back by Camara was able to regain first place at the session’s midway point and was then never headed.

Badoer set his best time on his final lap, including two fastest sector times, as he smashed his own previous best by 0.369s. Belov was third fastest.

Ivan Domingues took fourth to underline VAR’s pace, with Deligny and Giusti the only other drivers to break the two-minute barrier.

Belov was immediately on the pace again in FP2, setting a 1m59.728s to be on top at the end of the first runs, with Badoer just 0.088s behind.

Belov was unchallenged until the final 10 minutes as laptimes began to tumble, although it was Belov himself who made the first improvement before Badoer promptly responded.

R-ace’s Tuukka Taponen briefly assumed the top spot with six minutes left, before being demoted again by Belov.

With just over four minutes remaining, Camara jumped from sixth to first with a 1m59.053s, but Badoer was not to be beaten, lowering the best time by 0.003s before red flags brought practice to a close one minute early.

Free practice results

The post Badoer on top in tight FREC practice sessions at Paul Ricard appeared first on Formula Scout.