Heading into the Formula 4 Middle East Championship, 16-year-old Emanuele Olivieri had never finished within the top five of an F4 race, but he’s won four races and built up a 41-point lead over his rivals after two rounds. The R-ace GP driver sat down with Feeder Series to discuss his path to the top.

By Calla Kra-Caskey

The statistics speak for themselves: in six F4 Middle East races so far this year, Olivieri has taken four victories, a third-place finish, three pole positions, four fastest laps and 159 points.

His frontrunning form has come so naturally that it’s hard to believe he spent most of last year fighting to get into the points with AKM Motorsport in Italian F4. 

“It was very nice. It’s like the first time it became real,” Olivieri told Feeder Series of his first single-seater victory. “Winning gave me a lot of confidence for the next few races. Before race one I was slightly agitated, so winning helped me a lot.” 

His nerves didn’t show. Despite briefly losing his lead at the start, Olivieri turned his race one pole position into victory by 6.571 seconds over Kean Nakamura-Berta. In the reverse-grid race the next day, he climbed from eighth to third, and in the final race of the first round he helped himself to the lead after polesitter and R-ace GP teammate Alex Powell stalled. He held on and ended up with the narrowest winning margin this season, 0.071s, in what he called his best victory so far. 

“It was a race I dominated,” he said. “Since we don’t like making things easy for ourselves, we had a safety car and a last-lap restart, but I was able to hold off Nakamura-Berta with a good last lap.” 

In the first race of the second round, Olivieri again faced off against a charging Nakamura-Berta on the safety car restart and once again got the better of his rival.

“For the restarts, you always need a Plan A and a Plan B,” Olivieri said. “Not always are you in a race with only one safety car, so you need to expect two or three spots in which to restart. If you only use one, the driver behind knows when you’re going to go [the next time]. 

“Most of my restarts weren’t the best, but I managed to stay first. It’s an element that you always need to work on.”

Leading safety car restarts isn’t the only new challenge for Olivieri; he is also the only driver in the top eight who has never raced at the Yas Marina Circuit. Olivieri said, however, that from driving the track on the simulator, “it was almost like I had already been there before.” 

Olivieri has also adjusted to the Giti tyres used in the Formula Middle East championships – Italian F4 uses Pirellis – and said he had enjoyed driving on them because of their consistency. And between rounds, he adapted to the change from the full circuit to the shorter Corkscrew layout and dealt with the accompanying increase in tyre degradation. 

“I was a bit worried because I had never done any practice on that layout,” he said. “I went in the round not sure if I was going to do well, but a good aspect I have is that I can interpret a corner pretty well on my first try. Already after the first practice, I was going purple there.” 

Olivieri’s worries seemed to be unfounded. With two wins and a fourth place in round two, he took 79 points from the second round, just one fewer than his total of 80 from round one. Still, he understood why his sudden appearance in the win column might have come as a surprise.

“Nobody would’ve expected it. Not even I did,” Olivieri said. He added that he “would’ve never expected to fight with strong drivers” like Nakamura-Berta and Powell, citing their previous success in the series and support from F1 teams. 

Last year, when the series was still known as F4 UAE, Nakamura-Berta and Powell finished second and sixth respectively in the drivers’ standings for the Prema-run Mumbai Falcons team. They were also first and second among the rookies.

The pair looked to be the title favourites coming into the 2025, a label Olivieri has snatched from them in only two rounds. Nakamura-Berta, a former Alpine junior, is second on 118 points, while Mercedes junior Powell is fifth with 69 points.

This isn’t Olivieri’s first time battling with them either. Powell and Nakamura-Berta finished fifth and sixth for Prema in Italian F4 and once again paced the rookies’ standings. Olivieri, meanwhile, fought further down the field for AKM, scoring all 11 of the team’s points. He finished 17th overall in the championship and fifth in the rookie classification. 

Olivieri said driving for a backmarking team had contributed “a lot” to his approach to racing. 

“In my career, even in karts, I never was with the best team,” he said. “But I still raced, despite not having the best resources, aiming for wins. I don’t create a lot of excuses. I work a lot on myself and I want to win with the resources I have. Being with a high-level team helps, but I’ve paid my dues in the past.” 

Gratifying as it is to be fighting at the front of the field now, Olivieri isn’t resting on his laurels. 

“I have a big advantage, that’s true, but we’re only at the second out of five rounds,” he said. “For sure I’ll be careful, but I’m always there to race and give it everything as the championship is still pretty long.”

F4 Middle East returns for its third round of five this weekend at the Dubai Autodrome.

Interview by Marco Albertini

Header photo credit: Formula 4 Middle East Championship