Christian Ho made history in 2025 by becoming the first Singaporean driver to make it to FIA Formula 3 –but after a promising run in the series, he will swap his race suit for a combat uniform as he enlists for his mandatory National Service requirements. The 19-year-old sat down with the Feeder Series Podcast to reflect on his racing career, representing Singapore at the international level, and what he has planned next.

By Shermaine Wong

The Singapore Grand Prix has seen the world’s greatest drivers take to the Marina Bay Street Circuit since 2008. But beneath the spectacle of F1’s longest-running annual night race, Singaporeans have been yearning to see one of their own line up on the grid.

Christian Ho made that dream a tangible reality, breaking ground as Singapore’s first-ever FIA Formula 3 driver and flying the national flag at the upper echelons of international motorsport. It’s a path that required tremendous sacrifice.

Ho made the move from Singapore to Italy, widely considered the global capital of professional karting, at only 11 years old with his mother. 

“In Asia, I knew that if I wanted to compete with the best or drive with the guys who are going to be in Formula 1, I had to go to Europe. And that was the main reason for me moving to Italy,” he told the Feeder Series Podcast.

“I was just there with my mom initially, and it was not easy, definitely, adapting to a new place compared to Singapore, where everyone is so close and everything is so near. And then going to Italy, where I’d say maybe 20 per cent of people spoke English.”

It was a gamble to be separated from home by thousands of miles, and Ho missed out on core childhood experiences his Singaporean peers would’ve had in school. But Ho knew it was important to achieve his goal of making it to F1, and he went on to win several races in Spanish F4 and clinch the 2024 Eurocup-3 title as he climbed up the ladder.

“In the end, I got used to it, and I think I developed a lot as a driver, and I don’t think I would have reached the same place if I didn’t move to Europe at that age.”

A key factor behind his move to Italy was the limited infrastructure in Singapore to support local racing talent. While the Singapore Grand Prix has been a staple of the F1 calendar for nearly two decades, it is the country’s only major motorsport event. This is an issue driven mostly by land scarcity. The nation’s last international-standard permanent circuit, the KF1 Karting Circuit, permanently closed in June 2026. 

As Ho told the Feeder Series Podcast, the grassroots motorsport scene was much richer when Singapore still had a CIK-FIA Grade A track for international karting events.

“Pre-COVID, I think it was much more international because we had a lot of races going on here, like X30 Asia or World Cup Asia,” he said. “It was already quite a high level of karting, and we were pushing ourselves quite a lot. But nowadays, I mean, even after COVID, when international races didn’t happen in Singapore or they happened a bit less, you could tell that maybe the competition wasn’t as high. And even when I went coaching and stuff, it was very different from when I was there.”

The KF1 Karting Circuit helped catalyse Ho’s career, but it was also the place where he would go to coach and inspire the next generation of Singaporean racing talent. By proving that the Singaporean flag could fly consistently at the front of European grids, Ho was living proof that navigating the path from the KF1 launchpad to the F1 ladder was feasible. 

“Every time I came back to Singapore to the karting track at the time, it was always really cool to see it because when I was younger, I used to look at all the senior guys and really think I’ll actually be a bit scared,” he said. “And I almost felt like when I went back, I was that kind of figure for the younger kids. So it was really cool.

“At that time, being the first Singaporean to make it to FIA Formula 3 was honestly a really proud moment for me. And I knew I was going to be at an international level, where I was always going to be at Formula 1, and it was really cool to see the support on the track as well.”

But after five years on the European single-seater circuit, Ho will now tackle a new challenge. National Service (NS) is the mandatory two-year conscription that all Singaporean male citizens have to complete upon turning 18 years old. There are exceptions triggered by policies such as one’s educational timeline, which explains why Ho, who turns 20 at the end of October, is only enlisting now after the completion of his A-levels in maths, physics and higher-level maths in June.

Ahead of the 2026 F3 season finale, he had announced on Instagram that he would be taking a hiatus from racing, skipping the final round in Madrid. He shared with the Feeder Series Podcast that he knew early on that Monza would be his final race before his hiatus from the track. 

“Every year that I do racing, it’s always in the back of my mind, NS,” he said. “I always prepared myself for the scenario. And when it did happen, I was ready for it, definitely. In Monza, I kind of knew it was my last race, so I just took it all in, enjoyed my last weekend. And I have no regrets from this year except for, of course, I feel like I could have done a lot more with what I had with the team that I had because they did a really good job this year.”

Ho will therefore be taking a two-year hiatus from the racetrack and his academic studies. While he has not confirmed what he has planned following his NS, one thing is for sure, he said: “I’ll do something related to racing.”

To hear more from Ho as he prepares to step away from the track, check out the latest episode of the Feeder Series Podcast, available now on all major podcast platforms. 

Header Photo Credit: Dutch Photo Agency