Category: Formula 3

“We’re delighted to welcome Brando to Rodin Motorsport for FIA F3 in 2026”. Those were the words with which Benn Huntingford, Sporting Director of the team, announced via Rodin’s official Instagram page that Badoer will be continuing his FIA F3 adventure with a different outfit compared to this year.

The 19-year-old, who drove for the fellow Italians of Prema Racing in 2025, had a difficult year in the #1 car. His final place in the standings of 25^th with only 13 points, especially compared to team-mates Noel León at 17^th with 36 points and Ugo Ugochukwu at 16^th with 43, will be something he surely hopes to revert for 2026.

Whilst listing reasons for this second opportunity, Huntingford declared that Badoer had “shown great speed and maturity” and that he is “confident he’ll make a strong impact with the team”. A 5^th place finish in his only ever FRECA season in 2024 does give some sense to Benn’s words on the speed of the Montebelluna-born driver, but his involvement in more than a couple of incidents in this year’s FIA F3 campaign also shows he needs to improve his racecraft maturity to one day hopefully reach the heights achieved by his father and former Formula 1 driver Luca Badoer.

Despite a weaker year, he seemingly still has the support of the McLaren Driver Development Programme alongside prominent youngsters such as Norway’s Martinius Stenshorne, Ireland’s Alexander Dunne, and the aforementioned American Ugochukwu. The Italian will surely want to follow the footsteps of the first two, who have both made it to the silver lining of Formula 2 thus far.

On the other side of the 2026 Badoer-Rodin partnership, the New Zealanders have had a decent year in 2025 at 6^th, one position and 36 points ahead of Prema at 5^th. Monza Sprint winner Roman Bilinski was Rodin’s highest-placed driver in the championship at 11^th, whilst Callum Voisin (14^th) and Louis Sharp (26^th) completed the line-up of the British-based team. Brando Badoer becomes the 9^th driver (and the first for Rodin) to be confirmed to be competing in the 2026 FIA F3 championship. AIX Racing have already announced their full line-up, which will consist of returning drivers Fernando Barrichello and Brad Benavides, as well as newcomer Yevan David. Freddie Slater and Matteo De Palo will be two of Trident’s drivers, whilst Mattia Colnaghi and Alessandro Giusti will race for MP Motorsport. Jesse Carrasquedo Jr. will enter next year with Van Amersfoort Racing and, after the Badoer-Rodin announcement, Campos Racing also confirmed the signing of France’s Théophile Naël.

If you are a regular Formula 1 viewer and you want to get into watching Formula 2 and Formula 3 but don’t know much about the drivers, here is a short guide with their nationalities (and heritage), their associations (or past associations) and the teams they race in.

Formula 2

Invicta:

• Leonardo Fornaroli (N/A, last association: Ferrari) – Italian
• Roman Stanek (N/A, last association: Sauber) – Czech

Campos:

• Pepe Martí (Red Bull & A14) – Spanish
• Arvid Lindblad (Red Bull) – UK (Swedish nationality & Indian heritage)

MP Motorsport:

• Oliver Goethe (Red Bull) – German (Danish nationality)
• Richard Verschoor (N/A, last association: Red Bull) – Dutch

Hitech TGR:

• Luke Browning (Williams/Haas) – UK
• Dino Beganovic (Ferrari/Haas) – Swedish (Bosnian nationality)

Prema:

• Gabriele Minì (Alpine) – Italian
• Sebastián Montoya (N/A, last association: Red Bull) – Colombian (USA nationality)

DAMS:

• Jak Crawford (Aston Martin) – USA
• Kush Maini (Alpine) – Indian

ART:

• Victor Martins (Williams) – French (Portuguese nationality)
• Ritomo Miyata (Haas) – Japanese

Rodin:

• Amaury Cordeel (N/A) – Belgian
• Alex Dunne (McLaren) – Irish

AIX:

• Joshua Dürksen (N/A) – Paraguayan (German nationality)
• Cian Shields (N/A) – UK (Irish nationality)

Trident:

• Sami Meguetounif (N/A) – French (Algerian heritage)
• Max Esterson (N/A, last association: Red Bull) – USA (UK nationality)

VAR:

• John Bennett (N/A) – English
• Rafael Villagómez (N/A) – Mexican

Formula 3

Prema:

• Noel León (N/A, last association: Red Bull) – Mexican
• Ugo Ugochukwu (McLaren) – USA (Nigerian & Italian heritage)
• Brando Badoer (McLaren) – Italy

Trident:

• Noah Strømsted (N/A) – Danish
• Rafael Camara (Ferrari) – Brazilian
• Charlie Wurz (N/A) – Austrian (Monegasque & UK nationalities)

ART:

• Laurens van Hoepen (N/A) – Dutch
• Tuukka Taponen (Ferrari) – Finnish
• James Wharton (N/A, last association: Ferrari) – Australian

Campos:

• Nikola Tsolov (Red Bull & A14) – Bulgarian
• Mari Boya (Aston Martin) – Spanish
• Tasanapol Ithraphuvasak (N/A) – Thai

Hitech:

• Martinius Stenshorne (McLaren) – Norwegian
• Joshua Dufek (N/A, last association: Sauber) – Austrian (Swiss & UK nationalities, German heritage)
• Gerrard Xie (N/A) – Chinese (Hong Kongese nationality)

MP Motorsport:

• Tim Tramnitz (Red Bull) – German
• Bruno del Pino (N/A) – Spanish
• Alessandro Giusti (Williams) – French

VAR:

• Théophile Naël (N/A) – French
• Santiago Ramos (N/A) – Mexican
• Ivan Domingues (N/A) – Portuguese

Rodin:

• Callum Voisin (N/A, last association: Aston Martin) – Swiss (UK nationality)
• Louis Sharp (N/A) – New Zealander (UK nationality)
• Roman Bilinski (N/A) – Polish (UK nationality)

AIX:

• James Hedley (N/A) – UK
• Nicola Marinangeli (Ferrari) – Italian
• Brad Benavides (N/A) – USA (Spanish and Guatemalan nationality, Colombian heritage)

DAMS:

• Nicola Lacorte (Alpine) – Italian
• Christian Ho (N/A) – Singaporean (South Korean nationality)
• Matías Zagazeta (N/A) – Peruvian

Past drivers:

AIX:

• Javier Sagrera (N/A) – Spanish
• José Garfias (N/A) – Mexican
• Nikita Bedrin (N/A) – Italian (Russian nationality)
• Freddie Slater (N/A) – UK

DAMS:

• Nikita Johnson (N/A) – USA