Stunning driving from Brazilian Rafael Camara who extends his championship lead with second successive Formula 3 Feature Race victory at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Following on from taking pole position and winning the Feature Race with the fastest lap in Melbourne, Camara came into the round with the championship lead but he replicated such domination in Sakhir in the boiling Bahrain temperatures.

Camara won the Feature Race by over six seconds to Rodin Motorsport's Callum Voisin in second place. The pair had a good fight for the race lead in the early stages but it was the Trident of Camara that came out on top.

For the second successive year, MP Motorsport's Tim Tramnitz took third place in the Bahrain Feature Race. ART driver Tuukka Taponen and Saturday Sprint Race winner Nikola Tsolov rounded off the top five.

Camara extended his championship lead to 26 points over Tramnitz of MP Motorsport who sits on 30 points, as opposed to Camara's 56.

Grand Prix Sunday descended on the Bahrain International Circuit but that meant Feature Race Sunday for the FIA Formula 3 Championship with an exciting 22-lap race inbound following a stunning Sprint Race on Saturday.

On Saturday it was the Campos Red Bull junior Nikola Tsolov who took victory to win a record-equalling fourth race in the FIA Formula 3 Championship. He fought off a fierce and pacey debutant Freddie Slater, who drove brilliantly to finish second for AIX Racing.

However, for Sunday, the grid for the Feature Race was determined by the order of qualifying that was determined on Friday. For a second successive Feature Race, championship leader Rafael Camara was to start from pole position. He was to have Rodin's Callum Voisin alongside him on the front row.

Behind them on the second row would be the Trident of Charlie Wurz and the DAMS Lucas Oil of Christian Ho.

​The lights went out for 22 laps of racing at the Bahrain International Circuit and it was Voisin who got the best start as into the first turn he got ahead of the Trident of Camara and took the lead of the Feature Race. Wurz was behind in third.

There was no shortage of action at the start of the race with James Wharton being accidentally spun round by the DAMS of Matias Zagazeta, who was had not seen Wharton coming round the corner behind another car in Zagazeta's line of vision. Zagazeta was also side by side with Van Amersfoort's Ivan Domingues.

The incident was viewed as a racing incident and no further investigation was taken against the ART of Wharton or the Peruvian Zagazeta. 

Out front the leading pair had closed up and Camara was in DRS range of race leader Voisin. Into the first turn and Camara used the DRS advantage to get ahead and into the race lead. However, Voisin would use the DRS on the run down to turn four to get back ahead through the turn four, five, six and seven complex. 

Freddie Slater had a fantastic debut race in the Saturday Sprint Race but a form of issue with the car forced him into retiring his AIX Racing machine only on lap three. 

Also on lap three there was a brief Virtual Safety Car which had been caused by some of the debris that had flown off in wheel to wheel combat between drivers. This Virtual Safety Car was very brief with early on through lap four, the racing would be back underway.

Camara had not fallen back from the race leader Voisin despite being re-overtaken by the Rodin driver. On the fifth lap, the Brazilian would take the lead using the DRS advantage on the start/finish straight and was to stay ahead throughout the next set of DRS Zones.

Up to third on lap seven was Tuukka Taponen. The ART driver who finished third in the Saturday Sprint Race was back into third place again. Taponen passed the Trident of Charlie Wurz who had fallen back from the leading pair.

Overtakes were being made up and down the field with Tim Tramnitz on a charge from 13th on the grid. Lap eight and he took sixth from the Singaporean driver Christian Ho of DAMS Lucas Oil.

That lap would be positive for MP Motorsport with Tramnitz's teammate Alessandro Giusti also moving up a place via an overtake. Williams Academy driver Giusti made the move into 10th by passing the Prema of Brando Badoer.

​Birthday boy Mari Boya was making progress early on despite starting only 20th. By the halfway point in the race he was up to 12th after passing Noel Leon and was on the fringes of the points scoring positions.

Further forward a battle was forming for fifth with Noah Stromsted leading a trio of cars who were all eager to hold fifth place. The two that Stromsted had to contend with were Red Bull junior driver duo Tramnitz and Tsolov driving for MP Motorsport and Campos Racing respectively.

Stromsted was struggling for grip and lap 12 Tramnitz would make fifth place his own with a great pass to get ahead of the Danish Trident driver and that would be Tramnitz up into fifth and Stromsted down to sixth.

Tsolov showed great speed in the Saturday Sprint Race and was continuing to do so in the Sunday Feature Race. One lap later he would take sixth from Stromsted and followed his fellow Red Bull junior counterpart up the road. The duo were chasing Taponen and Wurz.

Prema usually dominate Formula 3 and have won every bar one of the Teams Championships since the championship began in 2019. After a difficult start to the season, they were hoping for better in Bahrain. The team were no doubt anxious when they had two driver, Brando Badoer and Noel Leon, fighting for position.

Fighting through the turns five and six, Badoer ran out of road and made the sensible decision to take to the run off area and rejoin behind his Mexican teammate Leon.

An incident was noted that happened between Campos' Tasanapol Inthaphuvasak and Rodin Motorsport's Roman Bilinski. The Campos driver appeared to find his way ahead of the Rodin driver off the track and subsequently was noted for leaving the track and gaining an advantage.

The Stewards would investigate the incident and would hand Inthraphuvasak with a 10-second time penalty as they saw he was the person responsible. This was one of two penalties in the race handed out with the other being handed to the McLaren junior Ugo Ugochukwu.

Ugochukwu had exceeded track limits more than the three strikes given to each driver per race. On his fourth occasion and Ugochukwu was handed a five-second time penalty which was added to his race time at the end of the race.

Alessandro Giusti had been showing great speed throughout the Feature Race and on lap 16 he took eighth from the DAMS Lucas Oil driver Christian Ho. Giusti and his MP Motorsport teammate Tramnitz were having strong drives through the field and one lap later Tramnitz had fourth from Charlie Wurz with another excellent pass at turn 4.

Tsolov was also keeping busy and keeping himself on a charge towards those podium places and the Bulgarian would move into fifth passing Wurz, who was beginning to struggle with tyre wear.

The same lap, lap 19, Tramnitz moved into the podium positions by taking third from Sprint Race third place finisher Taponen. Tramnitz was in position to finish third in a Bahrain Feature Race for the second sucessive Formula 3 season. 

Boya was another driver making progress he ended up in the points on lap 19 when he passed the other MP Motorsport car of Bruno Del Pino..

Moving onto the penultimate lap of the race and Noah Stromested was back up to fifth following a pass on teammate Wurz in a heated battle for position. Wurz was falling back and fell behind Giusti into seventh place.

Ho, Boya and Del Pino were all fancying their chances to get ahead of the Austrian driver. Onto the final lap and Wurz's tyres had completely fallen off and he had dropped out of the points paying positions, which were the top 10.

However, out front Rafael Camara had won the Feature Race in dominant style after he had to get back ahead of Callum Voisin in the early stages of the race. He dominated in Melbourne too by taking pole on the Friday and winning the Sunday Feature Race while taking the fastest lap too!

History was repeating itself and in doing so became the first driver to win the first two Feature Races in a FIA Formula 3 campaign and in doing so had extended his championship lead to 26 points.

Camara took victory from Voisin who finished second despite being over six seconds off the championship lead. MP Motorsport's Tim Tramnitz completed the podium in third place. Rounding off the top five were ART's Tuukka Taponen and Saturday Sprint Race winner Nikola Tsolov.

Coming home in sixth was Mercedes junior Noah Stromsted of Trident, who finished ahead of Mp Motorsport  and Williams Academy driver Alessandro Giusti in seventh. Birthday boy Mari Boya came home in eighth ahead of Bruno Del Pino and Christian Ho completed the point scorers and top 10.

It will be a while before FIA Formula 3 returns, which will be when the championship heads to Imola for the start of a very busy European season in over a month's time. Free Practice commences on May 16.

Brandon Whiteside
​Writer - F1 Journal

Red Bull junior driver Nikola Tsolov won a record-equalling fourth Formula 3 race after taking victory in the Bahrain sprint race on a sunny Saturday.

Tsolov, racing for Campos, held off a charging Freddie Slater who pressured the Bulgarian all the way to the line on FIA Formula 3 race debut! It was a very busy race that had lots of battling throughout as well as two Safety Cars and seven drivers failing to finish!

The Bulgarian racing driver took the win after a fantastic battle with Slater before the second Safety Car. Slater had a great debut but would have to settle for second for his maiden Formula 3 podium. Also, Tuukka Taponen completed the podium for his maiden podium finish in the championship.

Despite stalling on the grid, Rafael Camara fought back hard and finished 12th. He scored no points but the championship leader will start the Feature Race from pole position!

For the first time in almost a month, it was time for racing once again in the FIA Formula 3 Championship taking place at the Bahrain International Circuit. A venue that has played host to the last three Formula 3 season openers but in 2025 the Bahrain International Circuit was to play host to round two.

A track that Formula 3 had been familiar with in recent times with a three-day test for all 30 drivers at the end of March to get to grips with the modern era of Formula 3 machinery. With all having a decent experience of the circuit in recent times, it was set to be a close weekend throughout the field.

Friday's action was dominated by the championship leader Rafael Camara who picked up from where he left off in Melbourne. Topping the morning Free Practice was not satisfactory for Camara, who went and took a second successive pole position in Formula 3, in just his second Formula 3 qualifying.

Qualifying in 12th and crucially taking reverse grid pole position for the Saturday Sprint Race was the Hitech of Joshua Dufek and would start the race from the front of the field.

Hitech would have a great chance of scoring big points with a front row lockout on the Sprint race grid. Martinius Stenshorne would start alongside Dufek in second position. Behind them on debut would be Freddie Slater, would be participating in the AIX Racing 28 car for the second round. He would start third after qualifying 10th!

​ The lights went out and a positive start from Dufek saw him keep out the challenge from his Hitech TGR teammate Stenshorne in second place. A good start from the Austrian.

This left Stenshorne offset and under pressure from the debut Brit Slater and the AIX Racing driver would take second through the turn four- turn seven complex. What a start to his Formula 3 career!

Drama further back however as championship leader Camara stalled on the grid and dropped back, all the way behind the medical car which no doubt caused some panic in that Trident cockpit. However, the Brazilian driver managed to keep his cool and carry on for the rest of the race.

Lap three of proceedings saw a change for the race lead with Slater shining once more as he took the lead from pole sitter Joshua Dufek with a lovely pass into turn 1 - using the DRS advantage down the start/finish straight.

Puncture problems had been a themed issue for a few drivers in the opening three laps with AIX Racing's Nicola Marinangeli and Campos Racing's Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak suffering punctures and being forced to pit.

Both punctures had been caused by contact with other drivers. Marinangeli had made contact with the DAMS Lucas Oil of Nicola Lacorte whereas Inthraphuvasak made contact with the rear of Trident's Noah Stromsted.

However, there was a pause to the green flag racing action as the Safety Car was called upon on lap four of the race due to the two McLaren junior Prema drivers, Ugo Ugochukwu and Brando Badoer, colliding at turn 1.

Badoer would survive a scare from his teammate making a lunge but Ugochuwku would be out of the race and the incident would be investigated after the session between the two drivers. Ugochukwu and Marinangeli ended up retiring as Marinangeli pulled into the pit lane with extensive damage sustained from the Lacorte contact.

It would be a short stoppage and Ugochuwku's Prema car was quickly removed. By lap seven the race was back underway with green flags flying and Slater controlling the restart from Nikola Tsolov who had moved up to third place and was looking to hunt down the top two in Slater and Dufek.

At the restart, there were battles galore up and down the field. One at the restart was Tsolov who made almost an immediate pass for second on the Hitech of Dufek and the pole sitter was down to third and under pressure from his teammate Stenshorne.

Soon Tsolov had caught up to Slater's DRS and on lap nine he would make a move down the inside into turn 1 but the Campos had gone in too deep and gave the position back to Slater. The battle was getting very close for the lead of the Sprint at the Bahrain International Circuit. 

Meanwhile, Stenshorne took third from Dufek with a move into turn 1 and Dufek was struggling and beginning to fall back. He soon went on to lose fourth to the ART of Tuukka Taponen.

The battle was continuing on for a couple of laps between the leading pair but eventually on lap 11 Tsolov had a breakthrough. The Campos driver made a move on Slater and the AIX driver had done brilliantly but could contain the Red Bull junior much further.

Further behind French duo Theophile Nael and Nicola Lacorte had picked up damage and both were out of the Sprint. Both suffered with contact being made from behind and therefore both would be forced to retire due to rear suspension damage.

There was to be a second appearance from the Aston Martin Safety Car in the Bahrain Formula 3 Sprint Race. Tuukka Taponen had caught the top two at that point but unfortunately the race was neutralised?

The reason for the neutralisation would be a tangle between the Hitech of Dufek and the Van Amersfoort of Ivan Domingues who came together at the first corner. Both were out of the race and both were to be investigated after the race.

Formula 3 went back racing for two final laps after the Safety car was brought in and although he was trying with all his might to get a win on debut, Slater could not get by Tsolov and would have to settle for second.

Nikola Tsolov took victory in Formula 3 for a fourth time, which equals the record, and with the races left in the 2025 season. He has an opportunity to record his own! He would see off the challenges from Freddie Slater and Tuukka Taponen to take to the top step of the podium.

Slater with a tremendous debut and will be hoping to add to the podium and points picked up in the Feature Race where he will start 10th. The other two, Tsolov and Taponen will be hoping to do the same.

Completing the top five in fourth and fifth respectively were Rodin Motorsport's Callum Voisin and Hitech TGR's Martinius Stenshorne. 

Action would return on Sunday for the Feature Race at the Bahrain International Circuit with Rafael Camara from Feature Race pole position.

Brandon Whiteside
Writer - F1 Journal

Championship leader and Ferrari Academy driver Rafael Camara put in a stunning performance to take pole position for the second successive round at the start of 2025.

The Brazilian rookie made it the perfect Friday, after topping the morning's Free Practice session, where he beat Nikola Tsolov for fastest with a lap time of 1:50.984.

However, when it came to qualifying, Camara picked up from where he left off and took pole position for the second time in just his second ever FIA Formula 3 qualifying session and has put himself in a good position to add to his Feature Race victory in the season opener.

Camara took pole position from Callum Voisin of Rodin Motorsport, who went second fastest at the end of the session. Teammate of Camara, Charlie Wurz completed the top three in another great result for the Italian outfit.

After qualifying 12th, Hitech TGR's Joshua Dufek will start the Saturday sprint race from reverse grid pole. The reverse grid is set to have the front row locked out by Hitech TGR with Martinius Stenshorne qualifying 11th, is set to start second, with the top 12 reversed to form the sprint race grid.

Formula 3 may be feeling quite familiar with the Bahrain International Circuit, having tested here in recent times. However, it was time to put what was learnt in these new cars to good use, as it was time to go qualifying for round two of the championship.

It had been almost a month since the last race weekend of the FIA Formula 3 Championship took place at Albert Park in Melbourne, Australia. That round it was a brilliant showing from Trident but more importantly Rafael Camara who took pole on the Friday and then converted it to Feature Race victory on Sunday!

Camara leads the championship and already so far at Bahrain has shone. In testing, he set the fastest time across the three days. In addition, Camara topped Friday morning's Free Practice session prior to qualifying!

There would be a green light on at the end of the pit lane, and the 30 minutes of qualifying was underway with many cars heading out of the track early on in the session. Hanging back would be the Trident & AIX trios as they were wanting to avoid traffic on their laps.

The others would be fighting for a track position to give themselves the best possible opportunity to set the quickest possible lap times! Eventually, they would continue on to their first flying lap attempts.

After the first set of lap times it would be the Bulgarian Red Bull junior Nikola Tsolov who held provisional pole after an impressive first lap time for Campos Racing. After finishing second in the morning Free Practice session he was holding provisional pole with a 1:50.506.

Elevating themselves up to second and third respectively, following Tsolov's lap time, would be DAMS' Christian Ho and ART Grand Prix's James Wharton. A competitive field returned to the pits for a change of tyres ahead of their second flying laps in the session.

Track limits were playing their part in proceedings with many drivers having their lap times deleted so drivers needed to be careful as they headed back out onto the track with fresh tyres, in an attempt to improve their lap times.

On the second run was the Rodin Motorsport driver Callum Voisin who would take provisional pole with a great lap time around the Bahrain International Circuit. A 1:49.882 would be 0.023 in front of Alessandro Giusti who initially took provisional pole for MP Motorsport.

10 minutes remained and the top five were separated by 0.227 as Voisin led the way from Giusti, Rafael Camara, Nikola Tsolov and Charlie Wurz.

The track limits proved to be a problem for Campos' Mari Boya, Javier Sagrera and Louis Sharp as all three had their times deleted following violations on their fastest lap times. All three dropped into the bottom four positions of the timing pages.

Following one final pit stop and review of data, the 30 drivers headed back out onto the circuit for one final flying lap attempt at the Bahrain International Circuit in one final hunt for pole position.

With a magnificent lap on his final lap, championship leader Camara blew the rest of the field away with a stunning effort and set a 1:49.214 for Trident, which was going to take some beating but it would fail to be beaten!

For the second consecutive round, in just his second Formula 3 qualifying the Ferrari Driver Academy Brazilian, Rafael Camara, had taken pole position. A stunning effort from Camara and he was going to have a great opportunity at taking his second Feature Race win on Sunday.

Camara added two championship points to his tally as a result and therefore extended his championship lead by that amount. 

The Trident driver took pole position ahead of Rodin's Callum Voisin in second place, who after a great session missed out on pole position by over a tenth of a second. Camara's Trident teammate Charlie Wurz finished third.

DAMS' Christian Ho and MP Motorsport's Bruno Del Pino completed the top five in fourth and fifth respectively. All three had achieved their best qualifying in Formula 3 to date. ART Grand Prix's Tuukka Taponen finished sixth ahead of the third Trident of Noah Stromstead in seventh, which would round off another impressive qualifying for the team.

Eighth was Nikola Tsolov for Campos ahead of Alessandro Giusti in ninth of MP Motorsport. 

On debut, AIX Racing driver Freddie Slater impressed massively to qualify in 10th place and with the reversing of the top 12 for the Saturday sprint race, the British driver will start third. This will be behind Martinius Stenshorne and Joshua Dufek who qualified 11th and 12th respectively.

Joshua Dufek will be the driver who will start from the reverse grid pole position on Saturday in the sprint race, which will come next!

Brandon Whiteside
Writer - F1 Journal

Trident's Formula 3 Championship leader Rafael Camara set the fastest time in an uneventful Free Practice session, on Friday at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Camara shone in the weekend's opening round and with a fantastic lap in the final five minutes topped the session ahead of Red Bull Junior and Campos Racing driver Nikola Tsolov, who finished second. Finnish driver Tuukka Taponen finished third.

The session was non eventful due to recent mid season testing that had taken place for the Formula 3 drivers around the Bahrain International Circuit. Therefore, drivers only needed limited running. Only Ivan Domingues had set a lap with 15 minutes remaining in the session.

However, it was the championship leader Camara who set the fastest time, which was a 1:50.984.

For the first time since March it was race weekend action time in the 2025 FIA Formula 3 Championship. The second round of the season taking place in the city of Sakhir and at the Bahrain International Circuit.

With the drivers having a decent knowledge of the circuit following mid-season testing just over a week prior to the event, the drivers would be feeling confident ahead of the weekend. The circuit would be one that the 30 drivers would have a good recent memory of.

This would include AIX Racing's debut driver Freddie Slater who also competed in the three-day mid season test with his teammates Javier Sagrera and Nicola Marinangeli.

Free Practice would get underway with the green light coming on at the end of the pit lane. 45 minutes would be the session time, with the drivers having good understanding of the circuit.

With these factors, there would be little action throughout the first half an hour of the session with just Ivan Domingues having set a lap time for Van Amersfoort Racing. The Portuguese driver would register a lap time of 1:52.776 before pitting.

With under 15 minutes remaining there would be eventually cars on circuit with Domingues prompting the entrance of the entire field and there would be some lap times in the latter part of the session at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Campos driver Nikola Tsolov had shown great speed in mid season testing and the Bulgarian would rise to the top of the time sheets with a 1:51.111. Many drivers were setting competitive lap times, including Roman Bilinski who would go second fastest - albeit three tenths further back.

However, Tsolov would have to settle for second at the end of the session, as to finish top of the time sheets would be Rafael Camara with a 1:50.984 as the chequered flag signified the end of Free Practice in Bahrain.

Camara would be fastest ahead of Tsolov with the ART of Tuukka Taponen making it two drivers inside the top three part of the Ferrari Driver Academy! Santiago Ramos of Van Amersfoort Racing would be fourth, with MP Motorsport's Alessandro Giusti completing the top five.

Trident's Charlie Wurz was sixth ahead of seventh place driver Roman Bilinski. MP Motorsport driver Tim Tramnitz was eighth ahead of his teammate Bruno Del Pino in ninth. Ugo Ugochukwu completed the top 10 for Prema Racing.

Action would return for the qualifying session, later on in the Friday session which would set the grid for both races.

Brandon Whiteside
​Writer - F1 Journal

The FIA Formula 3 Championship returns to racing this coming weekend as the second round of 2025 is to take place at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Formula 3 has become very familiar with the Bahrain International Circuit in recent seasons with the championship having been tested at the venue in recent times. In addition, Formula 3 has also become used to racing in Bahrain, having raced at the circuit every year since the first visit in 2022.

Since the first visit for Formula 3 in 2022, there has been a lot of track action and a lot of different winners around the world famous Middle Eastern race circuit, which is used for the Formula One and World Endurance Championships.

It will be the first time that the Formula 3 grid will go racing in 2025, since the season opener that took place down under - situated in Melbourne, Australia.

While the racing in Melbourne was almost a month ago, Formula 3 visits Bahrain having tested there in recent times. FIA Formula 3 recently visited the Bahrain International Circuit for a three-day mid season test during 24-26 March.

The Bahrain International Circuit, situated in Sakhir, is made up of 15 corners and has a lap distance of 5.412km. Around the circuit, there are plenty of overtaking opportunities around the circuit, which has a total of three DRS Zones.

The DRS Zones can be found on the runs toward turns one, four and 11. This is set to provide fascinating action in the weekend's two races. The sprint race on Saturday is set to last 19 laps while Sunday's feature race is set to last 22 laps.

Formula 3 has a lap record around the Bahrain International Circuit that was set in the first visit to the circuit back in 2022. Argentine Franco Colapinto, who has since raced in Formula One for Williams, holds the current lap record which is a 1:46.249.

The 2025 championship enters round two after Trident rookie and 2024 Formula Regional European Champion Rafael Camara shone by taking Feature Race victory from pole position in Melbourne.

Camara picked up 28 points in the feature race, despite not scoring at all in the previous day's sprint race. This came from the pole position, race victory and the fastest lap.

The Brazilian was joined on the podium by Trident teammate Noah Stromsted and Theophile Nael in an all-rookie podium, which would be a testament to the level of talent in quantity that has joined the Formula 3 grid in 2025.

Formula 3 would also see a new winner in the Sprint Race too, with the Mexican racer Santiago Ramos taking the win for Van Amersfoort Racing.

Exciting times ahead this weekend in Bahrain for British motorsport fans this coming weekend as reigning Italian F4 Champion Freddie Slater will make his Formula 3 debut with AIX Racing.

Slater will experience his first Formula 3 race just in the second round of the 2025 Formula 3 Championship, with AIX Racing not having a driver contracted for the full season in the number 28 car.

The Brit will become the second driver to participate in that number 28 car, following Italian racing driver Nikita Bedrin who scored 17 points and currently sits fourth in the standings after round one.

​Slater is set to compete full time in the 2025 GB3 Championship with Hillspeed and the Formula Regional European Championship by Alpine (FRECA) with Prema Racing. Prema led current Formula 3 championship leader Rafael Camara to glory in 2024.

Speaking to Formula 3, Slater said: "I will make the most of this opportunity working with the AIX Racing team at Bahrain. It's always been a circuit I have wanted to drive, so to get to test and race F3 there will be a massive privilege."

Brandon Whiteside
Writer - F1 Journal