As the reigning F1 Esports Series champion, the 2023 eRace of Champions winner and a current McLaren Shadow driver, Lucas Blakeley is a star of the sim racing and esports scenes. Having made a handful of appearances in FF1600 over the past year, he made a shock announcement that he’d be making his slicks-and-wings debut in GB4 less than a day before the round commenced. Feeder Series caught up with him in the paddock at Snetterton.

By George Brabner

Blakeley had karted in his younger years but was forced to stop because of a lack of funding as a teenager. At the start of 2022, the Scotsman stole headlines when he beat four-time Formula One world champion Sebastian Vettel in a direct heat at the Race of Champions, which kickstarted what became a special 12 months: he competed in Formula Ford for the first time in the summer before being crowned F1 Esports champion in December.

As the new year came around, Blakeley made his FF1600 return with KMR Sport. After Jeremy Fairbairn’s mid-season departure from the outfit in GB4, he tested the team’s spare Tatuus F4-T014 for two days at Snetterton – only to then announce that he would compete in the race weekend less than 48 hours after turning the car’s wheel for the first time.

“I mean, it’s been a whirlwind of a week. Seven days ago, last Sunday, I was probably grinding the F1 game! And then one week later, here I am at Snetterton driving GB4 cars, which is something that I never thought was once possible. First of all, a big thank you to KMR Sport and SD Team for making this possible because, without their support, this wouldn’t have happened. That is the reality,” Blakeley told Feeder Series.

Progressing to the top five

Originally, Blakeley was only set to test for two days with KMR Sport. With no experience in a slicks-and-wings car and minimal real-life seat time, it was a relatively pressure-free opportunity for Blakeley to learn the ropes of Formula 4.

However, with a personal best lap time less than 1.5 seconds behind pacesetter Cooper Webster – who also competes in sim racing as part of the Red Bull Racing esports team – Blakeley suddenly had a competitive GB4 debut on the horizon. 

Every time I got in the car, I felt like I was doing something better

Lucas Blakeley

“This weekend’s been a heck of a roller-coaster. So much to try and absorb and learn jumping in the car for the first time Thursday and just trying to improve and get better ever since.

“Every time I got in the car, I felt like I was doing something better, which is the thing that I’ll take away from this weekend and be proud of. It’s how we methodically chipped away at it and we went from three seconds off, to two seconds off, to one second off and then to being within the upper regions of between half and one second off at times,” he said.

Over one lap, Blakeley was only 1.1 seconds away from pole and more than two seconds closer to the leader than he was at the end of Thursday’s first test session.

“I’ve got lots of positives to take from this weekend, mainly qualifying. When everything was just sort of chips down, I had to extract something, and to get P4 was beyond what I thought was possible,” Blakeley said.

Trying to convert pace to points

Being fast over one lap is one thing, but turning that into race results is another. Ultimately, Blakeley’s weekend wasn’t perfect: he had a slow start in race one, spun trying to avoid another car one lap later, and dropped to seventh in race two.

However, his speed was evident, and so was his progress in racecraft and race awareness.

“I think we showed pace for P4 in all of the races, it was just a lot of situations and a lot of things that get between you and that result, which is only natural given you’re doing your first race start on the grid of your first race.

“And you’re following in dirty air for the first time in the second race because you didn’t really get the chance in the first with having to avoid collisions. It was just a big weekend of firsts,” Blakeley explained.

“You’re never always going to have an optimal result where everything goes smooth and you get the results where your pace sort of looks. But what I’m proud of is the fact that we were right in the mix.

“The top three were in a different league, which is to be expected, but to be right in the thick of the field against drivers that have raced all season and maybe even multiple seasons… for me just to turn up on Thursday and do as well as I have, I’m very very happy,” he said.

“I will always want more – me being me, I’m a perfectionist at heart so I would always want more out of it results-wise – but I just tried to give it absolutely everything and I loved the experience.”

Fulfilling a dream

In sim racing, Blakeley is at the top of his game. He races for McLaren’s esports team, he’s the reigning champion in the highest-profile series in the world, and he’s only 21 years of age. So why start again in a lower-level category such as GB4?

“Because ultimately, I have to do justice to the 14-year-old Lucas who thought he would never get this opportunity. It’s that simple…

“I have to do justice to the kid that thought this dream was over, because, ultimately, this is where my passion for racing began. It was to go and do real racing. So if the opportunity comes up to do it, I’m going to grab it with both arms, and I’d not be doing justice to myself if I didn’t,” Blakeley explained.

It’s been a privilege, and I look forward to being able to look back at this in the future

Lucas Blakeley

“Whether it’s the only time I’ll race this in my entire life, this is what I dreamed of doing and this is a weekend that once upon a time would have been impossible for me. And it’s been made possible for me through the world of sim racing that’s given me a platform to raise my skills, regardless of what people say.

“Ultimately, when I make a mistake, it’s ‘because I’m a sim racer’, but when someone else makes a mistake it’s because they’re ‘trying their best’. I’m used to the stigma, I’m used to the judgement, but it’s not going to stop me one bit, because ultimately, I don’t really care what other people say,” he continued.

“I’m really glad that I at least showed that if this is the last ever time I jump in a GB4 or an F4-spec car, that I at least showed that with the time that I had, I gave it a good crack and that maybe I’m not that half bad.

“It’s been a privilege, and I look forward to being able to look back at this in the future.”

Header photo credit: Jake Potter Photography