What Have Our Junior Drivers Been Up to?

It’s been a busy couple of days for our Junior Programme with plenty of racing action last week in Abu Dhabi, lots of strong results to talk about and also some 2024 plans being announced too.

With so much going on for the Junior Drivers, we thought we’d update you on what they’ve been up to.

Fred’s F2 Success…

After a few months of waiting, Frederik Vesti wrapped up his Formula 2 season in Abu Dhabi. He went into the finale 25 points behind his title rival Theo Pourchaire in the championship battle and knew he needed a big weekend to out-score him.

That’s exactly what Fred did. But sadly, it wasn’t enough. He took a dominant win in the Sprint Race and went from P9 on the grid in the Feature Race to P3 at the chequered flag, but the Danish driver missed out on the title by 11 points.

Nevertheless, Fred gave it his absolute all and enjoyed a successful season, claiming six wins across the year. Lots to be proud of after a very impressive 2023.

And F1 Experiences!

Friday was a particularly busy day for Fred as between F2 practice and qualifying, he had his F1 FP1 session with us. He was driving in place of Lewis - our second and final mandatory rookie session of the year - and did a very good job, finishing the session P12.

He then had to (literally) run to his F2 car for Qualifying with just 25 minutes between FP1 ending and F2 starting.

Fred was then back in the W14 on Tuesday in Abu Dhabi for the post-season test where he completed 106 more laps behind the wheel of our F1 car.

Testing Round-Up: What Happened in Abu Dhabi

Back Behind the Wheel

Andrea Kimi Antonelli has a busy week ahead of him with Formula 2 post-season testing taking place from Wednesday to Friday in Abu Dhabi. It’s his first time driving an F2 car!

The Italian will be driving at the test with Prema, the team he’ll be racing with in 2024, and it’s set to be an exciting few days getting up to speed in an F2 car.

Solid Progress for Alex

After his initial taste of F4 with the final rounds of the Italian series, Alex Powell was racing on the Abu Dhabi GP support bill in the 2024 F4 UAE Trophy event. It’s a non-championship round and gave Alex more vital F4 experience with Prema. He enjoyed a solid weekend, finishing P6 and P7 in the two races. Nice job, Alex!

2024 Plans Confirmed

Yuanpu Cui had his racing plans confirmed for 2024 and will be graduating from karting to single seaters. He was announced as an Argenti driver in British F4 for next year – very exciting news! And he’s already been busy testing his F4 car over the past few weeks.

Luna’s Strong Result

Luna Fluxa, one of our youngest Junior Drivers, competed in the Champions of the Future Academy Program in Abu Dhabi – an event aiming to make karting more accessible and open the doors to a wider variety of drivers around the world.

She put in some impressive performances in the heats and qualifying rounds. The big final in the OK-N Junior category was on Wednesday and Luna put in a strong result, battling for the podium, and eventually finishing fourth.

Find out more about our Junior Drivers here.