Each season, the Formula 3 grid features a large number of rookie drivers, with more than half of the 2025 grid being new to the series. At a virtual media roundtable earlier this week, Feeder Series spoke to two team bosses, Trident’s Giacomo Ricci and Van Amersfoort Racing’s Bradley Joyce, to understand how teams help drivers with the step up to F3.

By Tori Turner

Several of the drivers who left the biggest impression on F3 have been rookies. In four of the past five seasons, at least one rookie has been in championship contention entering the final round, with Oscar Piastri in 2020 and Gabriel Bortoleto in 2023 even taking titles in their first seasons in the series.

With over half of the 2025 season completed, Trident’s Rafael Câmara has been the strongest rookie on the grid. The Brazilian has dominated qualifying sessions, taking four of five poles, and won three of five feature races to take an early championship lead of 26 points over his closest rival, third-year driver Nikola Tsolov.

All great F3 rookies have to start somewhere. When it comes to helping drivers transition between categories, teams begin by assessing the level at which they previously competed.

 ”First of all, it depends on which category the drivers come from,” Trident team manager Ricci told Feeder Series. “The jump from Formula 4 to FIA Formula 3 is a very, very big jump, whilst from Formula Regional or Eurocup-3 the jump is a little bit smaller in terms of differences between the two cars,” 

Câmara entered F3 as the reigning champion of FR Europe, having stormed to the title with seven wins and 309 points throughout the season. Fellow Trident rookie Noah Strømsted also raced in the series last year and finished sixth overall to win the rookie championship. He is currently fourth overall in F3 and the second-best rookie behind Câmara.

Eleven of the F3 rookies in 2025 ran campaigns in FR Europe last season, with three coming from GB3 and two from Eurocup-3. The most recent driver to have made the jump to F3 directly from F4 was 2023 Italian F4 champion Kacper Sztuka, who finished 27th last season for MP Motorsport.

Once drivers sign contracts with teams for the following season, the transition to the next step in their careers formally begins. For many drivers, this entails lots of preparation on simulators and meetings with their teams for coaching sessions. 

“From what we are doing on our side, we are organising several days to coach them and teach them how to drive the car and the basics. We can also recognise immediately if the driver can reach the right pressure with the brake and those kinds of things. We can understand, even from the sim session, if the basics are right,” Ricci said.

“Alongside this, we try to involve them in the team as soon as possible, even starting from the year before. We have, within the window that is allowed, some private testing.”

Van Amersfoort Racing fields two rookies in 2025: Théophile Naël and Ivan Domingues, both FR Europe graduates. Team principal Bradley Joyce, who joined the Dutch outfit in October 2024, echoed the importance of testing and simulator work but also noted the limited track time new F3 drivers have.

“A lot of drivers are used to a lot of testing prior to their racing, and in F3, you don’t get that before a race weekend,” Joyce said. “You’ve only got just one [practice] session, then it’s qualifying. So there’s a different approach to what they’ve been used to.”

Beyond adjusting to the car and the circuits, drivers also have to understand how the series works, Joyce added.

“When you get to FIA F3, there’s quite a lot more involvement in procedures and regulations – things like that which they have to be aware of, where a driver can potentially make mistakes,” he said. “There’s a lot of work on eliminating silly mistakes and also on how they approach a race weekend so that they get the most out of it.”

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency