#i hope chloe gets a freca seat next year

[madamkarenin]

Chloe Chambers testing and giving feedback on the next gen f3 car, and Sophia Floersch test driving an f2 car. Things are looking up ladies!!

[dreamsrussell]

f1 academy silly season this year is going to have a huge impact on the future of the series & women in single-seater motorsport as a whole. here’s some more information (cross-posted as a thread on my twitter, also dreamsrussell)

for some context, f1 academy is a women-only racing series that is most similar to formula 4. drivers are eligible to compete for two years; after that, they are no longer eligible because the goal is to help advance women through the junior series. 

2023 was the first season of f1 academy. 2025 will be the first year where some drivers will no longer be eligible. this year, 2023 champion marta garcía & runner up léna bühler advanced to FRECA. 

abbi pulling, both al quabasi sisters, nerea marti, bianca bustamante, jess edgar, lola lovinfosse, emely de heus, and carrie schreiner will not be eligible to compete in f1a in 2025. as far as i’m aware, none of their seats for next year have been announced. 

essentially, 2025 is the first time we’ll see how successful f1 academy can be at promoting young female drivers. where should we be looking for them to be going? 

well, FRECA and formula 3 are the most sought-after spots, though it is likely some will remain in formula 4 for another season as they hope to make a big enough mark to secure the funding necessary to race in these expensive series. 

estimates place the cost of running a single f3 season at around 1.2 million dollars, and drivers who are associated with academies can expect to have an academy fund about half of that if they’re lucky. 

another option is formula e, the electric series; nerea martí and chloe chambers were announced today to be testing for andretti later this year. 

chloe chambers was the first f1 academy 2025 driver to be announced, and the haas-backed race-winner is joining red bull racing’s ford seat for 2025. it seems like more 2024 f1a rookies are likely to stay with the series for next year, but if other stand-outs like maya weug and doriane pin can secure seats in higher series, a move up isn’t out of the picture.

because f1 academy gets relatively little media coverage compared to other junior series, we don’t know a lot about who is expected to move into some of the seats opening up; nina gademan had one of the best wild card performances of the season and seems to be a favorite for one of them.

so why does this matter? i don’t think anyone reasonable should be expecting f1 academy to erase institutional bias against women in motorsport in a single season, but it’s important that f1a makes its mark on the media and their sponsors in order to secure its place going forward. 

these girls have worked so incredibly hard, and susie wolff described on the red flags podcast this week what is already being called the f1 academy efffect; more young girls are interested in karting bc they female role models to look up to.

that's all i have to say about this for now, but basically i just want to make f1a fans and f1 fans in general aware of how pivotal this silly season for f1a is going to be, even if it doesn't get the media coverage that it deserves.

[formulaford2022]

My predictions cause I'm bored

f2:

Antonelli and Mini

Mini and Linblad

Mini and Beganovic

Mini is getting that seat. If Antonelli doesn't get the merc seat he's staying for sure. If Arvid wants to move up, he's getting it over Dino. If Arvid fights for the f3 championship again (although I say he moves up and does two seasons of f2 and then takes the rb seat in 2027) (rb is running a Liam Yuki lineup for two years before one leaves. trust me please) Dino would get the seat, but imo Lindblad has a much higher chance for f1 than Beganovic does. )Luke Browning is getting a hitech f2 seat I know it) (My dream lineup next season would be Mini Browning but that is not happening).

F3:

Lindblad, Camara, Taponen

Lindblad, Camara, Wharton

Camara, Taponen, Wharton

Camara, Taponen, Pin

Camara, Wharton, Pin

Camara, Taponen, Slater

Camara, Wharton, Slater

Basically if Arvid stays he's getting the seat. Rafael Camara is getting that seat for sure. Taponen would slay in the lineup and he has f3 experience and did pretty good, however Wharton is not doing too terrible and also has f3 experience so I guess it depends. Merc would be smart to move Pin up to f3 if they ever want to field that absolutely slay lineup that would be Antonelli/Pin, however they'll probably do another year of freca for her because they hate to see women shine. I'm feeling a Slater to freca move, but idk he seems like someone who would skip a level.

FRECA:

Ugochukwu, Wharton, Slater

Wharton, Slater, Pin

Ugochukwu, Slater, Pin

Powell, Slater, Pin

Ugochukwu, Powell, Slater

Wharton, Slater, Powell

Wharton, Slater, Weug

Ugochukwu, Slater, Weug

Slater, Pin, Weug

If Wharton doesn't move up to F3, he definitely is staying with Prema. Pin is dependent on if Iron Dames runs a few cars again. (Same with Weug. Idk if she would do Iron dames or just straight up prema, but I think she should've been doing freca this year anyway). Slater is getting that seat unless he makes the move to f3 (which in that case some other variation of Wharton/Ugochukwu/Pin/Powell/Weug). Ugo's season has been pretty decent and I could either see him staying another year or moving to a different team. Powell is doing really well in f4 and would be the best bet for a move up to freca.

F4:

Not doing a bullet list for this cause idk how many cars they are going to have. I could see Powell, Nakamura-Berta, and Stolcermanis running again next year, unless Powell moves up to freca. I think Hausmann would do good to run Italian F4 and F1 Academy at the same time (and F4 UAE) (Please let her do F4 UAE at least). They're definitely moving Oleksandr Bondarev up from karting. For F1 Academy, I would say keep Hausmann, bring up a girl from karting (maybe Luna Fluxa?), and try and get Chloe Chambers for her second season. (Unless Chloe chooses to move up to freca. In that case offer her a seat before someone else does. I love Iron dames but they cannot have every female driver) (though technically Prema is Iron dames, because Iron Dames is Iron Lynx and so is Prema).

Indycar:

Callum ilott and someone from the former prema world. (for personal reasons I hope it's Fred Vesti) (It won't be, but I hope it is.) (this one is for fun I honestly have no idea) (Callum Ilott/Rinus Veekay would go so hard) (I would cry if it was Alexander Rossi)

Theres not enough people talking about how Prema is going to have a huge lineup change next year in all their categories and its lowkey stressing me out

F2

With Ollie leaving for Haas this frees up one seat for next season and nobody knows currently if Kimi is leaving for F1 next year or staying in f2. If Kimi does end up leaving that means Prema can move up 2 drivers (probs from f3) and have an entirely new line up or if he stays they can move up one f3 driver

F3

W/ Gabriele and Dino both on their 2nd year of f3 they're more than likely gonna be looking for an f2 seat next season and Arvid has had an amazing season but I doubt he'll be moved up bc he's a rookie. So if Kimi stays in f2 theres only one seat available for either Dino or Gabriele and the one who doesn't get picked will more than likely jump teams to get into f2 like Arthur and Paul. But if Kimi leaves 2/3 of the f3 lineup gets a promotion.

Freca/Formula regional by Alpine:

The only one in their second year is Rafa Camara who is currently running away with the championship, so he'll more than likely be moved up to f3 or something next year. James wharton and Ugo Ugochukwu are only in their first year, so they won't be moving. Though I wish Maya could've been put into freca again and not just f1a

Italian f4:

They literally have 6 drivers wtf. Nakamura-Berta, Stolcermanis and Powell are all rookies, so they won't be looking to move up next season. Which leaves Al Dhaheri, Gowda and Slater available but seeing as only Freddie Slater is the only "vet" top 5 in the standings hes the only one I see moving up to freca. But then again Italian f4 is also hard af so they're not exactly shitty, so they might end up jumping teams to got to freca.

F1a/F1 Academy:

Man I honestly have no idea what the fuck they're doing w/ the girls especially w/ the 2 year limit, probs drop them ngl. Maya should be in freca again alongside Dorianne smh

Im basing most of these on the driver spending 2 years minimum in each category ngl and this is just my opinion so dont kill me