Corvette factory sports car driver Nico Varrone thought his single-seater days were in the rear-view mirror – until a hashtag on social media went viral in his native Argentina and attracted the attention of Formula 2 team AIX Racing, who snapped him up for the final day of F2’s 2024 post-season test in Abu Dhabi last week.

By Michael McClure

Varrone has a glittering racing résumé featuring an LMGTE Am title in the 2023 World Endurance Championship, wins in the 2023 and 2024 editions of the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the LMGTE Am and LMP2 Pro-Am classes respectively, and an LMP3 class win at the 2023 24 Hours of Daytona.

The 24-year-old, who became a factory Corvette driver at the end of last year, is a professional in the ascendancy on the endurance racing scene. So why come back to open-wheel racing via last week’s post-season test in F2, the most expensive junior single-seater category?

The answer, Varrone explains, lies in the power of a 14-character hashtag on X, formerly Twitter: #NicoVarroneaF1.

It began trending in Varrone’s native Argentina, a country with a revitalised motorsport fanbase thanks to one Franco Colapinto. When Williams Racing promoted F2 rookie Colapinto to F1 in late August, the nation’s first F1 driver in 23 years gained millions of followers on social media and became a commercial sensation in Latin America.

“Argentina is a country with a lot of history in motorsport and a lot of passion, but now with all this and the social media with Franco, it generated something else,” Varrone tells Feeder Series from the Abu Dhabi paddock, an hour after the F2 test concludes. “And all the social media stuff is getting a lot of power also for the companies that want to invest in stuff, and a lot of exposure.”

As Colapinto’s standout early F1 form tailed off, rumours around whether he’d be on the grid in 2025 quieted. So when General Motors’ entry to F1 for 2026 was conditionally approved 25 November, Argentines saw another opportunity: an online push for Varrone – already aligned to General Motors via subsidiary entity Corvette – to move to single-seaters in an attempt to replicate the path Colapinto trod to success.

“Two weeks ago, I was not going to be here,” Varrone admits. “It all started with a hashtag on Twitter from Argentina. It was a friend of mine [racing driver Lautaro de la Iglesia] – when all of this General Motors thing happened, he started a hashtag on Twitter, just for fun.

“Suddenly the next day I woke up and it was, like, tendency [trending] number one in Argentina. And I was called by all the media and everyone, and sponsors calling me wanted to be on the project and I was like, ‘What project?’, and then everything started and people wanted to come on board.

“And we started chatting for the options and AIX Racing gave me the opportunity to be here, so they gave me the chance and made the test happen,” he continues. “It’s pretty crazy.”

@NicoVarrone #NicoVarroneaF1 🇦🇷 https://t.co/ANXEUwfIRQ

— Lauti de la Iglesia (@laudli) November 25, 2024

Before he began preparations for his test appearance with AIX on Friday in Joshua Dürksen’s car, Varrone hadn’t sat behind the wheel of a single-seater in more than four years. He raced FRenault 2.0 cars from 2016 to 2018 in Argentina and won the 2018 V de V Challenge, his first championship outside of South America, in the same cars.

Varrone then raced in British F3 in 2019 and 2020. He won a reverse-grid race on his second weekend in the series at Spa but never managed to run a full season.

“No way,” he says when asked if he envisioned a return to single-seaters. “I had to quit British F3 because of budget. We always struggled with this.

“Luckily, I got my career going in endurance racing thanks to a lot of people, and in the end, I managed to win races there, with great factories, winning great races, racing with top-level drivers. Honestly, I was really lucky.

“I never expected to be back because [in junior single-seaters] it’s different. You need to bring money and we never had this as a family, so I couldn’t get a more random way to be here than a hashtag.”

Once the ball started rolling, those involved in getting Varrone to F2 arranged a test for him at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in a Dallara GP2/11 car, used in the second tier from 2011 to 2017. That test took place Tuesday, and he arrived at the Yas Marina Circuit midday Thursday to begin preparations with AIX and do a seat fitting Thursday evening.

“Honestly, I arrived really green because I went to test the GP2 and it rained all day, so I barely did any laps,” he says. “I didn’t do any laps in the dry. I just drove in the rain, so … I was like, ‘Okay, it cannot be more green to run here.’ Like, no preparation at all. I was driving in Malaysia in Asian Le Mans last Sunday, so imagine – it was completely different, honestly unexpected, but [I’m] super happy with how we went today.”

Varrone ended the morning session, in which drivers focused on qualifying performance, 22nd fastest with a 1:37.665, 1.892 seconds off pacesetter Victor Martins’ benchmark of a 1:35.773. Teammate Cian Shields finished 20th, 0.158 seconds ahead of Varrone.

In the afternoon session, Varrone was one of only a handful of drivers to have done a qualifying run. After sitting out the opening hour, he led the way for 59 minutes in the second half of the session with a 1:37.423. Pepe Martí usurped him for the top spot with 20 minutes remaining, but Varrone remained second in the afternoon classification, 0.072 seconds off the Campos driver. He was the only driver to set a faster time in the afternoon than the morning.

“Driving the F2 car for first time here in Abu Dhabi was not easy, but it was really enjoyable,” he tells Feeder Series after the session. “Different car, different style of driving, this was the most difficult. But after the first run and getting the runs, the laps in, it was better.

“At the end of the morning, with the used tyres, I did a lap time that I was really happy [with]. I was close to the pack and without new tyres. I was happy, and then in the afternoon we tried with the new [tyres], and all the learning I did in the morning paid off. So between the afternoon a bit unexpected for me, but [I’m] super happy with this.”

While others in F2 this year have taken unorthodox paths to reach the series – among them Dürksen, who jumped up from FRegional and skipped F3 – none navigated a change in machinery quite as significant as Varrone’s.

As he explains, braking, cornering and steering inputs in the Dallara F2 2024 all require different approaches to what he knows from GT cars and prototypes.

“With the Corvette, it’s much different. It’s nothing to compare,” he says. “But with the LMP2, that is something similar. I feel the power braking of the F2 is much, much higher. It’s something I was improving during the day and I still have to work on.

“The difference on the tyres, you know, with two compounds to get it to work, how to prepare the tyres, this I think I managed quite well. Still, obviously, there is more room to improve and to get better.

“Then as I was expecting, more minimum speed on high-speed corners – actually, I think the P2 even is higher on high-speed corners. That surprised me. My neck is better than when I drive the P2, so that could say something.

“But for sure, the different driving style, the way you approach the corners, here you have to be more aggressive with the steering. In the LMP2, everything is more direct. It’s really direct, so you have to be really clean and [steer] with small inputs. Here you have to be more aggressive, wrestling more the car. So it’s a different beast, and for sure during the day, it was improving, but there’s still a lot to get better.”

Alongside preparation with AIX, Varrone also received help from Dürksen, who was on site in Abu Dhabi on Friday to help Varrone acclimatise to his new surroundings. But Dürksen – who will continue with AIX in F2 in 2025 – reveals to Feeder Series that when the final F2 round of 2024 began a week and a half ago, he was expecting to drive on Friday too.

“When the race weekend started, I was expecting to do the whole three days,” the Paraguayan says. “They just told me, what, two days ago? ‘Hey, Josh, there’s maybe going to be another driver driving your car on the last day’. I’m like, ‘Ah, really?’ So I really don’t know a lot of his plans, to be honest, but of course, I wish him all the best for the future.”

Several of Argentina’s top 21st-century racing talents are notable for succeeding in multiple disciplines. José María López, once set for a 2010 F1 seat with the stillborn US F1 project, took three consecutive World Touring Car Championship titles from 2014 to 2016 before winning both the 2021 24 Hours of Le Mans and the 2019–20 and 2021 WEC drivers’ world titles as a factory Toyota driver. More recently, multiple TC2000 chapmion Agustín Canapino energised Argentines when he swapped touring cars for single-seaters in a move to IndyCar in 2023 with Argentine-owned Juncos Racing.

It’s too early even for Varrone to know where his F2 test appearance may lead him, but many hope he can become the next Argentine driver to swap disciplines and excel.

“It was going to be always difficult, but thanks to AIX Racing, they helped me a lot with their preparation. They were super nice with me,” he says. “And also, thanks to all the sponsors from Argentina that were supporting me to be here and also to all the people from Argentina that make the hashtag tendency number one and everyone pushing for an Argentinian to be back in Formula 2. We’ll see what happens next.”

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency