Formula 3 stopped at the Red Bull Ring for the fourth round of the 2026 season, delivering a shocking qualifying session and dramatic races throughout the weekend. Hiyu Yamakoshi dethroned Théophile Naël for the first time this season to take pole, whilst Ernesto Rivera and Noah Strømsted were victorious in the two races. Feeder Series recaps the main talking points that may have gone under the radar in Austria.

By Tori Turner

Strømsted topped Friday’s practice session, a sign of what was to come later that weekend, but it was Van Amersfoort Racing’s Yamakoshi who took his maiden pole position in the series later that afternoon. The Japanese driver could not convert his pole to a win, however, losing out on first position on the first lap of the feature race. Ugo Ugochukwu and Freddie Slater both held it at various points, but in the end, Strømsted defeated both on Sunday morning to take his first win of the season. In Saturday’s sprint race, Ernesto Rivera took the victory, beating Pedro Clerot and Jin Nakamura to the top step.

• Pre-weekend roundtable: How in-season testing and extreme heat will affect F3’s Spielberg weekend
• Qualifying report and quotes: Yamakoshi keeps the momentum going with F3 pole in Austria
• Sprint race report and quotes: Rivera seals injury comeback with maiden F3 win in Austria sprint
• Feature race report: Strømsted triumphs in blockbuster F3 feature at the Red Bull Ring

1. Strømsted bounces back after Barcelona

After the first three rounds of the 2026 season, Noah Strømsted’s results appeared average on paper, if not a little underwhelming when compared to his rookie season. Despite sticking with top team Trident for his second season, he had failed to score a podium, a feat that teammate Slater had managed to achieve three times already before Austria. 

Strømsted’s qualifying results had been inconsistent before heading to Austria, with finishes of 10th in Melbourne, 10th overall in the group format in Monaco and 22nd in Barcelona. In Spielberg, the Dane achieved his best qualifying result of the season during Friday’s session – fourth place, with a 1:21.859 – which set him up for his later success. 

The weekend was not without its flaws, as Strømsted made contact with teammate Slater during the opening lap of Saturday’s sprint race. The Briton retired as a result of the damage sustained, but the Mercedes junior was cleared of any wrongdoing and did not receive a penalty. By finishing fifth, he picked up a healthy six points to offset his non-score in the previous round. 

But it was Sunday that Strømsted really shined. He was hungry for victory from the beginning, making up a position on the opening lap of the race to slot into third. After Slater passed him on the safety car restart on lap four, he remained in fourth place until he came alive again in the race’s final quarter. He stole third away from polesitter Yamakoshi on lap 21 and second from Ugochukwu on lap 23 before overtaking teammate Slater for the lead on lap 24 to take his first feature race victory.

Strømsted now sits sixth in the championship standings with 41 points, having moved up nine positions in the table from 15th. In just one round, he more than quadrupled his previous tally of points, proving that is capable of the performances we witnessed from him in 2025 and more.

2. Naël experiences his worst weekend yet…

Heading into the fourth round of the season, Naël was without a doubt the driver to beat in qualifying. He had secured pole position at every track in the first three rounds, and there was no reason to believe that he couldn’t set the new record for the most consecutive poles in F3 after equalling Rafael Câmara’s record in Barcelona. However, the Frenchman appeared far from his usual form in Friday’s session, making uncharacteristic mistakes that left him down the lower end of the order.

Across the 30-minute session, he exceeded track limits on three occasions, all at different corners. With those lap times deleted, he was left down in 24th at the end of qualifying with a 1:22.348, which was 0.618s off Yamakoshi’s pole position lap. His voided 1:22.226 would have placed him 18th.

More crucially, he was the lowest-placed driver in the top four of the championship standings, with rivals Ugochukwu second, Slater fifth respectively and Del Pino 13th. Depending on how the races played out, Naël appeared to be in deep trouble with his title rivals now holding the advantage.

This unexpected result meant he faced a great challenge to try to make it into the points-paying positions in both races. The Campos driver proved he still had pace despite his flawed qualifying attempt as he made his way up to finish 15th in both the sprint and feature, though his efforts still left him with no points. 

As a result, Naël has dropped one position in the championship standings to sit third overall, having been overtaken by Slater, who is now 10 points ahead of him. Despite not adding any more points to his tally and watching his gap to Ugochukwu balloon from six to 26 points, the unpredictable nature of F3 means his title hopes remain firmly intact.

3. As other frontrunners face difficulties

Van Amersfoort Racing’s Bruno Del Pino had been widely praised as being F3’s most consistent driver through the opening three rounds. But almost as soon as he burnished that reputation, his streak of seven consecutive points finishes came to an end in Sunday’s feature race.

Like Naël, Del Pino had his worst qualifying performance of the season by finishing 13th, though that was only one position lower than his result in Melbourne. Still, points finishes seemed possible in either race considering he only had to make up a total of three positions to earn them come race day.

At first, it seemed the streak would end on Saturday. Del Pino finished only 11th when the chequered flag waved at the end of the sprint, but he narrowly took the last points-paying position after the disqualification of Kanato Le, who originally finished sixth, due to a technical nonconformity. The Spaniard was not as fortunate in the feature race, however. He went backwards throughout the first half of the race and by lap 16 had fallen to 19th, where he remained until the end. He would later move up to 17th after time penalties were applied to Mattia Colnaghi and Alessandro Giusti. 

After only scoring one point this weekend, Del Pino has moved down to fourth in the standings, though he has decreased the gap to Naël.

Likewise, Brando Badoer also had a weekend to forget in Austria after failing to score points across an entire round for the first time this season. Proving how crucial qualifying is in a championship like F3, a measly result of 29th left him with little hope of scoring any points, though he managed to climb up to 21st in the final classification of both races. The Italian did not lose a position in the standings, but Strømsted now sits directly behind him on equal points, making dropping out of the top five a real possibility depending on how he fares in Silverstone. 

Results and standings after round 4 at Spielberg

Results	P1	P2	P3
Qualifying	Hiyu Yamakoshi, 1:21.730	Ugo Ugochukwu, +0.015s	Tuukka Taponen, +0.045s
Sprint race (21 laps)	Ernesto Rivera, 31:31.362	Pedro Clerot, +1.787s	Jin Nakamura, +2.597s
Feature race (26 laps)	Noah Strømsted, 39:16.300	Ugo Ugochukwu, +1.373s	Freddie Slater, +2.043s

Standings	Drivers	Teams
P1	Ugo Ugochukwu, 78	Campos Racing, 156
P2	Freddie Slater, 62	Van Amersfoort Racing, 109
P3	Théophile Naël, 52	Trident, 103
P4	Bruno Del Pino, 49	Rodin Motorsport, 79
P5	Brando Badoer, 41	ART Grand Prix, 47
P6	Noah Strømsted, 41	MP Motorsport, 32
P7	Pedro Clerot, 38	Hitech, 24
P8	Hiyu Yamakoshi, 32	DAMS, 22
P9	Taito Kato, 30	Prema Racing, 21
P10	Enzo Deligny, 28	AIX Racing, 6

Read our takeaways from the previous round here.

Header photo credit: Dutch Photo Agency