ART Grand Prix’s James Wharton secured his first Formula 3 victory in the sprint race at the Red Bull Ring, with MP Motorsport’s Alessandro Giusti and Prema’s Ugo Ugochukwu completing the podium. Feeder Series spoke to Wharton after the race about how his experience of battling Giusti for victory here in FRegional Europe last year influenced his approach to the race. 

By Tori Turner

Reverse-grid polesitter Wharton maintained his position on the run down to Turn 1, beating Giusti, who remained close throughout the opening lap. Behind them and Charlie Wurz, Prema’s Ugo Ugochukwu passed teammate Brando Badoer for fourth off the line and held the position despite running wide at Turn 3.

The first of two safety cars appeared on lap two after DAMS’ Christian Ho dove down the inside of Rodin Motorsport’s Louis Sharp into Turn 3 but outbraked himself, hitting Tuukka Taponen just in front. The damaged ART Grand Prix car slowed on the run-off on exit and tagged Sharp, who had run wide in avoidance. All three cars retired, and the stewards deemed Ho responsible for the incident and handed him a 10-second time penalty.

When racing resumed on lap five, Tsolov, who started 12th, made up another position on Voisin down the inside of Turn 1 for seventh and fended off the British driver on the run to Turn 3. 

Voisin then fell into the clutches of Bruno Del Pino and Brad Benavides, who were disputing ninth. They both passed the Rodin driver into Turn 3 on lap seven but made contact. Both drivers continued until they reached pit lane, where Benavides, who starts tomorrow’s feature race on the front row, retired after sustaining a front-right puncture. Del Pino pitted for a new front wing and returned to the race at the back of the field

On lap nine, Tsolov passed his championship rival Câmara around the outside of Turn 6 to move up into sixth. Câmara fought back throughout lap 10 and ran alongside Tsolov, but he dipped two wheels onto the gravel at Turn 4, which caused him to lose two more positions to Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak and Martinius Stenshorne. 

Meanwhile, Giusti hounded Wharton and had several looks on the Australian driver on the run to Turn 4. The two drivers are no strangers to racing one another wheel to wheel from having raced in FRegional Europe last year, with Wharton beating Giusti to the win at this very track back in September.

“It’s probably nearly 12 months to the day that we were doing it in FRECA,” Wharton told Feeder Series. “I feel like it helps in knowing the guy beside you and the driver that you have behind you. It makes you feel a lot more comfortable if you’ve raced them clean, especially Alessandro. He’s one of the cleanest drivers out there and you have to respect someone like that. We have a good amount of respect for each other. At the end of the day, when you know the person, it’s much easier.”

On lap 13, Badoer lunged on Ugochukwu for fourth into Turn 3 but ended up hitting Wurz, who was on track to take his first podium in third. Wurz’s race ended there after he spun, triggering the second safety car of the race, while Badoer pitted to replace his front wing and damaged right-front tyre.

With Wurz out of contention, Ugochukwu moved up to third but soon had to defend from the charging Tsolov on the restart on lap 18. The McLaren junior briefly went wide heading out of Turn 1 but held onto his position as Tsolov faced a challenge from his Campos teammate Inthraphuvasak into Turn 3.

Out front, Wharton got a strong restart and broke free from Giusti’s DRS at the end of lap 19, giving him some temporary breathing room. The Williams junior regained some time on the last lap to finish 0.612s behind Wharton, who became Australia’s first race winner in F3 since Jack Doohan in 2021.

Ugochukwu held off Tsolov for third, taking his and the team’s first F3 podium in 2025. He did so with a stripped-back carbon fibre livery after running in McLaren’s papaya colours for the first five rounds.

“It was to help on the weight side of things,” Ugochukwu told Feeder Series about the livery change. “I was being a little bit disadvantaged through the first part of the year, so this is really the first time I’m on an equal playing field with the rest. I’m not sure how much it helped, as the car has also been in a much better place this weekend. Maybe it’s a little bit of a combination of all the things coming together. We definitely made a good step this weekend.”

Tsolov finished just shy of another podium in fourth, crucially gaining six points on Câmara for his championship bid, as teammate Inthraphuvasak finished fifth for his fourth points finish of 2025. 

The third Campos of Mari Boya – who became an Aston Martin junior earlier this week – rose from 14th to sixth despite a damaged front wing, triumphing in a four-way battle on the last lap. Tim Tramnitz made up 10 positions to finish seventh after starting 17th thanks to a poor qualifying session, with Stenshorne and Voisin losing out on the last lap to finish eighth and ninth respectively.

On the penultimate lap of the race, Câmara tumbled down the order from sixth to 10th after running wide at Turn 3 while battling Stenshorne. Boya, Voisin and Tramnitz all passed the Trident driver, who clung to the final points-paying position on the last lap despite attacks from Théophile Naël.

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency