The British F4 Championship returns for its 11th season with what promises to be tense competition for both the main crown and the new Challenge Cup class for partial-season drivers. Feeder Series provides all the key details you need to know.

By Gavin Guthrie

The 2024 British F4 season saw Hitech’s Deagen Fairclough storm away from the rest of the field in a record-breaking sophomore campaign in which he took 14 wins across the year. But coming into 2025, the field looks to be much tighter. Promising rookies such as 2024 Ginetta Junior Championship title rivals Ethan Jeff-Hall and Chase Fernandez have closed the gap to the second-year drivers through testing. 

British F4 also has an addition to the prize pool in the £25,000 to be awarded to the winner of the Challenge Cup, a new class for drivers competing in a maximum of seven races across the season. The Challenge Cup is targeted at those running a dual campaign or those without the necessary budget to complete the season, a phenomenon becoming increasingly frequent as prices rise across all racing categories. The prize can be used towards entry fees for the full 2026 British F4 season.

The calendar

The introduction of an international round at Circuit Zandvoort in the Netherlands last year proved to be a positive addition to the series, enticing seven drivers – including several F1 Academy drivers due to appear on the F1 support bill at Zandvoort later in the season – to make part-time appearances in the championship.

In 2025, British F4 will once again serve as a support category for the British Touring Car Championship at eight race weekends, as it has done since the series’ days as a Formula Ford championship. It will also return to Oulton Park after a year away in lieu of an appearance at the Brands Hatch Indy layout. 

• Round 1: Donington Park Circuit, National layout (26–27 April)
• Round 2: Silverstone Circuit, Grand Prix layout (2–3 May)
• Round 3: Snetterton Circuit, 300 layout (24–25 May)
• Round 4: Thruxton Circuit (7–8 June)
• Round 5: Oulton Park Circuit, Island layout (21–22 June)
• Round 6: Circuit Zandvoort (26–27 July)
• Round 7: Knockhill Racing Circuit (16–17 August)
• Round 8: Donington Park Circuit, Grand Prix layout (30–31 August)
• Round 9: Silverstone Circuit, National layout (20–21 September)
• Round 10: Brands Hatch Circuit, Grand Prix layout (4–5 October)

The format

As in previous seasons, there will be two practice sessions, a qualifying session and three races per weekend. The grid for race one will be determined by the second-fastest time achieved by a driver during qualifying. Race two’s grid will be formed by reversing the top 12 of the qualifying order; the rest of the field will start where they qualified. The full qualifying order is used to set the grid for race three. 

Also unchanged from last year is the points distribution. Two points will be awarded to whichever driver sets the fastest legal lap in qualifying. 

Races one and three will award points according to the standard FIA distribution, with 25 points for first, 18 for second, and so on down to one point for the tenth-placed driver. The reverse grid race awards 15 points for first, 12 for second, 10 for third, 8 for fourth, 6 for fifth, 4 for sixth, 2 for seventh, and one for eighth. 

Race two also awards a point per position gained relative to the driver’s position on the starting grid, up to a maximum of 10 points. All three races also award one point for the fastest lap.

Drivers competing in either the Rookie Cup or the Challenge Cup will receive points towards their respective class in the same distribution, though no bonus points will be awarded for either the fastest lap in class or positions gained.

Points for the teams’ championship will be awarded based on the finishing position of the two highest-placed drivers in each team.

Teams and drivers

Hitech

Deagen Fairclough’s record-breaking championship campaign, along with strong performances from Reza Seewooruthun, helped the silver-and-red Hitech outfit take the teams’ title by 66.5 points over Rodin Motorsport in 2024. A new partnership with Toyota’s Gazoo Racing programme announced at the end of last year will serve as an additional confidence boost for the reigning teams’ champions as they head into this season.

Australian Xavier Avramides (#4) will be making the step up from karting in 2025. The 17-year-old progressed through the OK and KZ2 categories between 2023 and 2024, achieving several race wins along the way. Avramides tested with Hitech towards the end of 2024 and will be looking to develop throughout the season as he competes for the Rookie Cup.

Red Bull junior Fionn McLaughlin (#5) made his single-seater debut earlier this year in the Formula Winter Series, also with Hitech, and immediately demonstrated frontrunning pace. The 17-year-old Irish driver took three wins from 12 races, including an impressively confident drive on slicks in cold and greasy conditions at Motorland Aragón to win the race with a 6.782-second lead. He finished third overall in the championship, and given his speed over the winter, a challenge for the drivers’ title is well within the realms of possibility for McLaughlin.

Only 12 points ahead of McLaughlin in the winter was Leo Robinson (#6), who joins Hitech for his second British F4 season after an impressive 2024 with JHR in which the Anglo-Algerian driver claimed three wins and a further three podiums to finish sixth in the overall standings. During his run in FWS earlier this year, he achieved three wins and four second-place finishes to take the runner-up spot in the championship. Robinson, 16, will be looking to maintain the momentum that has been building since the latter half of 2024 to mount an early championship challenge while less experienced drivers find their feet in the series. 

Thomas Bearman (#7), the younger brother of Haas F1 driver Ollie Bearman, made the step up to F4 towards the end of last year after turning 15 in August. He competed in the final two rounds of British F4 and one round of Euro 4 before taking part in FWS over the winter alongside McLaughlin and Robinson. Bearman has yet to make the same impression on track as his teammates, managing only eighth in the standings in FWS with one podium, though, in conversation with Feeder Series, team manager Dominic Stott noted his development over the winter and said the young Briton has the potential to perform better once he settles into the car throughout the season.

Rodin Motorsport

Rodin Motorsport come into 2025 having had a strong but ultimately disappointing season by the team’s standards, finishing 66.5 points adrift of Hitech. Their 2024 line-up featured four drivers who each had at least a year of car racing experience, and as they look to retake the teams’ championship in 2025, they will once again field one of the most experienced line-ups on the grid.

The least experienced of the line-up – and the only Rodin driver eligible for the Rookie Cup – is Adam Al Azhari (#12), brother of GB3 driver and Alpine junior Keanu Al Azhari. The 15-year-old Emirati made his single-seater debut in the third round of the Spanish F4 championship last year, racing with Tecnicar for the final five rounds of the season, before competing in the 2025 F4 Middle East Championship, in which he took his first pole position.

McLaren development driver Ella Lloyd (#20) will be competing for the Challenge Cup, as she, like her Rodin predecessor Abbi Pulling, primarily contests the F1 Academy championship this year. The Welsh 19-year-old made her single-seater debut in 2024 with JHR, achieving four podiums across the season and finishing 11th in the championship standings. Her final position could have been higher had she not missed the penultimate round to be the wild card entry in F1 Academy’s Singapore round. 

Rodin’s most experienced driver for 2025, Jimmy Piszcyk (#93), made his British F4 debut in 2023, racing with Hitech and achieving two wins on his way to fifth in the standings. For 2024, Piszcyk returned to his native Australia, where he had made his car racing debut in Formula Ford, to compete in the Australian F4 championship, taking all nine wins from the first nine races en route to a dominant championship win. This performance drew the attention of Rodin management, earning Piszcyk a return to the European racing scene. This year will be make-or-break for the 18-year-old, who has little room for excuses as one of the most experienced drivers in F4 machinery on the grid.

JHR Developments

2024 marked the third consecutive year in which JHR Developments finished third in the teams’ championship. A relative lack of full-time drivers has cost the Dronfield-based outfit in recent years, with Leo Robinson being their only driver to compete in every round of the 2024 season. This season, JHR will again field a rotating driver line-up, with several drivers confirmed to be competing in the Challenge Cup.

Eighteen-year-old Harri Reynolds (#32) is the first of JHR’s Challenge Cup contenders to make an appearance on the grid, having raced with the team at last year’s Silverstone National round towards the end of the season. Aside from his one-off appearance in British F4, Reynolds’ 2024 season was spent competing in the Britcar Trophy endurance championship, having earned the seat through the Dragon Sport scholarship in February of the same year. Through testing, the Welsh driver’s pace has been consistently in or around the top 10 and will likely improve as the season progresses.

For full-season driver Rowan Campbell-Pilling (#42), moving to JHR from Argenti marks something of a full-circle moment in his single-seater career thus far after he completed his first F4 test with the team back in 2023. The Sheffield-based 18-year-old had a season of two halves in 2024, finding his feet in the series through the early rounds before making a marked improvement to his qualifying results and racecraft through the summer. He achieved back-to-back second-place qualifying results at Knockhill and Donington Park and finished outside the points on only three occasions in the final four rounds of the season. Campbell-Pilling will hope his intense off-season training programme has helped him to iron out the occasional errors that limited his chances at winning the Rookie Cup as he prepares for a title challenge in 2025.

On Friday morning, JHR announced that Joel Bergström (#22) would be competing with them this season. The Swede made his F4 debut with the Dronfield-based team at the start of the 2024 season, but budget issues forced him to miss the fourth round before he abandoned the championship entirely after only one more weekend behind the wheel. Despite spending the rest of 2024 without a drive in any single-seater category, 18-year-old Bergström has been quick to re-adapt to F4 machinery, consistently matching Campbell-Pilling throughout pre-season testing.

Argenti Motorsport

Michael Meadows’ Argenti team has served as the proving ground for Mercedes junior drivers in recent years, having fielded Yuanpu Cui in his debut season in cars last year. The team enjoyed decent success en route to fourth in 2024, with Cui and Campbell-Pilling finishing the season second and third in the Rookie Cup respectively. For 2025, the team will field an expanded line-up, with three drivers starting the first round at Donington Park and a fourth already confirmed for a mid-season entry.

American driver Henry Mercier (#13) began his karting career in 2022 at the relatively late age of 13, but despite his relative lack of experience, he was quick to rise to the level of his competitors in Europe. Having tested with Argenti several times towards the end of 2024, Mercier will be making his single-seater debut and looking to challenge for the Rookie Cup.

The Mercedes F1 team links through Ron Meadows – Mercedes’ sporting director and father of Argenti team principal Michael – have influenced the signing of reigning FIA Karting OK class world champion and Ginetta Junior champion Ethan Jeff-Hall (#25). The 16-year-old Briton’s step up to F4 machinery has been highly anticipated as a result of his numerous karting accolades, and his performances through testing, with several fastest times overall, have exceeded expectations thus far. A challenge for the title is well within the realm of possibility for Jeff-Hall despite his relative lack of experience in single-seaters.

August Raber (#47) returns to the series for a second season, making the switch from Xcel Motorsport after a difficult 2024 campaign. The 16-year-old managed only two finishes inside the top 10 in a campaign derailed by a broken wrist  he sustained in an incident at the first race at Thruxton, which forced him to withdraw from the rest of the weekend as well as the following round at Silverstone. Now recovered, the Swedish driver has made great improvements over the winter, achieving his maiden podium in the F4 UAE Trophy and a maiden win in F4 Middle East. With this newfound form, Raber looks to be a much more complete driver heading into 2025.

Despite being ineligible to compete until midway through the season as a result of British F4’s age minimum age limit, 14-year-old Arjen Kräling (#62) has already had his seat confirmed with the team for the second half of the year. Germany’s Kräling spent 2024 competing in the X30 Junior class of the British Kart Championships as part of the Argenti karting team, and through this connection, he began his F4 testing programme at the end of last year. He will continue to train with the team ahead of his debut at Zandvoort in July.

Virtuosi Racing

Virtuosi Racing fielded three single-seater debutants in 2024, including the eventual Rookie Cup winner Martin Molnár (#24). Thus far, Molnár is the only driver confirmed at the team, though the Hungarian told Feeder Series that he is unlikely to be the sole competitor for the Norfolk-based outfit.

The only full-season driver from last year to remain with the same team, Molnár had modest success as he adapted to the new cars and tracks. From Zandvoort onwards, however, Molnár managed to turn up the wick, producing several podium finishes and ultimately clinching the win by 11 points over Yuanpu Cui. The 16-year-old will be looking to build on the success he found with the team last year to put together a challenge for the title. 

Fortec Motorsport

Fortec Motorsport experienced something of a weaker year in 2024, dropping from fourth in the teams’ championship to sixth. Like Virtuosi, the Daventry-based outfit have only announced one driver for 2025 thus far.

Their lone competitor, 15-year-old Henry Joslyn (#26), spent 2024 competing in the Ginetta Junior Championship for a second year. The Briton achieved four wins and a further eight podiums on his way to fourth in the standings. Joslyn’s testing performances have indicated promising pace as he makes his single-seater debut.

Chris Dittmann Racing

After entering two and sometimes three cars in 2023, Chris Dittmann Racing found themselves in the unenviable position of having no drivers for the Thruxton round of the championship last year owing to sole driver Bart Harrison’s one-round licence suspension issued for an off-track altercation the week prior. In addition to Harrison, the team fielded several drivers making one-off appearances, including 2023 Rookie Cup winner Gustav Jonsson. Ultimately, however, these cameos were not enough to raise their points tally significantly, leaving them with about a fifth of their 2023 points haul. They will run three Challenge Cup entrants in 2025.

Sixteen-year-old Tommy Harfield (#21) spent the first half of 2024 competing in the BRSCC Fiesta Junior Championship, achieving back-to-back wins at Croft in July 2024. As a member of the CDR driver development programme, Harfield began testing F4 machinery back later that same month, though an injury while testing at Knockhill prevented the Briton from seeing out the Fiesta Junior season. 

Another member of the CDR driver development programme, Charlie Edge (#27) also had extensive testing experience ahead of his single-seater debut, first running in the current Tatuus F4 car back in March 2024. The Worcestershire-based driver is entered into the seven-round Challenge Cup, but he told Feeder Series that depending on his performances, he may appear in more rounds this season and forgo the Challenge Cup. Edge has also confirmed that the 2025 British F4 season will be the first of a two-year programme already agreed in principle with the team as the 15-year-old adapts to the car and tracks this year ahead of a title challenge in 2026. 

Also joining the team to contest the Challenge Cup is Danish F1 Academy driver Alba Larsen (#40). Larsen’s single-seater debut came in Indian F4 in 2024, and she scored points in three of the five races she entered. In November of the same year, Larsen became the fifth driver confirmed to be competing in the 2025 F1 Academy season, and she currently sits fifth in the standings, ahead of the more experienced Lloyd, having scored points in every race. The 16-year-old will hope that her performances in the modified F1 Academy–spec Tatuus will translate well to the standard package employed in British F4.

Xcel Motorsport

Last year’s newcomers to the grid, Xcel Motorsport had a challenging introduction to the British championship, with Raber’s injury preventing him from competing at two rounds of the championship and Zack Scoular finding himself caught up in incidents while running inside the top 10 on several occasions. For 2025, Xcel will expand to a four-car line-up.

Theo Palmer (#23) will join the team’s line-up from the second round at Silverstone once he turns 15. Palmer competed with Xcel’s karting outfit in the UAE, taking wins in both junior and senior karting classes. Having already had some promising results during testing, Palmer will be looking to build on his existing talent throughout the season and has already been appearing in test sessions such as Thursday’s at Donington Park. 

South African Cole Hewetson (#33) made his single-seater debut in the F4 UAE Trophy last year before competing in the F4 Middle East championship with Xcel at the start of this year. The 15-year-old achieved several points finishes across the two championships. Through pre-season testing for British F4, he has steadily improved his pace, running in the fringes of the top 10 on several occasions.

Sixteen-year-old Yuhao Fu (#69) had a tough debut season with Virtuosi last year, only making one appearance in the top 10 and regularly qualifying at or near the back of the field. He performed markedly better in the four Chinese F4 rounds he entered, taking two race wins at Zhuhai en route to fourth overall. The Chinese driver raced with Xcel in F4 Middle East earlier this year, scoring points in several races and taking pole for the reverse-grid races on three occasions. Fu will hope the change of team and the momentum that he brings into this season will have turned his fortunes around from last year.

2024 Ginetta Junior runner-up and Alliance Racing young driver programme member Chase Fernandez (#90) comes into British F4 with significant anticipation behind him. After making his debut as a guest driver in the final two rounds of the Spanish F4 championship, the Briton competed in the F4 UAE Trophy with Xcel, scoring points in four of the seven races of the winter championship. Ahead of the first round of the British F4 season, the 16-year-old competed in the first round of F4 CEZ, taking a podium in his first race at the Red Bull Ring. 

Header photo credit: Scott Mitchell Photography