Behind the scenes of F1 Academy’s inaugural rookie test

Driving identical machinery to those currently competing on the calendar, and supported by renowned teams in the junior ranks, the 18 were given six hours of track time at the Circuito de Navarra, 100 miles southeast of the northern Spanish city of Bilbao.

The day was split into two three-hour sessions, with each driver handed three sets of Pirelli tyres. Whilst the obvious aim was to show their speed and circuit craft, building up to get the most out of the rubber at their disposal, hitting the track was only day two of the rookie programme.

The opening day focused on driver development, initially with the field observing briefing and engineering sessions alongside the current drivers, before undergoing a range of physical and cognitive tests.

Yes, proving they had pace and talent were the obvious targets to hit, but the 18 also had to show they were physically adept and mentally attuned to cope with the demands of becoming an F1 Academy driver.

For the highly successful and popular series approaching the end of its third campaign, the intention was to tap into the growing pool of female racers and identify the best to take part next year and beyond.

"It was always the ambition to run something like this," said Katie Denver, the Performance and Development Manager for F1 Academy. Part of her brief is to identify and prepare new drivers for the series.

"The reason it came about is when I started loosely scouting I was out and about looking at different F4 series, different karting championships, which is great when you're in that environment and you can benchmark the drivers against the other drivers in that particular series.

"But when you start looking across the broader landscape, actually trying to benchmark those drivers against each other, when you've got no reference point in terms of them competing or testing against each other, it was actually becoming quite difficult to differentiate.

"We know which series are more competitive than others, for example, but some of the more obscure or maybe slightly different routes that some of the drivers had taken meant that we decided we really needed to get them all together in the same place at the same time, and truly look at them off track and on track, and assess them all in the same conditions."

Although several drivers will leave F1 Academy after their two-year cycle at the end of this season, including this year’s leading trio of Doriane Pin, Maya Weug and Chloe Chambers, there will only be around seven seats available for 2026.

The wheels, however, have been set in motion for those who may not be selected on this occasion.

"What we wanted to get from it as well, because we don't have seats for every rookie driver that comes in, is a baseline, a benchmark to say, OK, if you're looking at F1 Academy in 2027, 2028, here's some advice, guidance, feedback that we can give you that will hopefully help your progression and preparation.

"For those who do get selected — great, a very worthwhile exercise. For those maybe a little further back in their experience, they hopefully found the test a really good learning experience and development opportunity, and they'll still take some great development points from it to hopefully strengthen them moving forward."

Denver concedes that narrowing it down to 18 meant that for the selection panel, there was "a bit of head scratching going on", though creating "a good problem to have" as it underlined the growing wave of female drivers trying to make their way in motorsport.

On track, the same four drivers were quickest at the end of the morning and afternoon sessions, albeit in a different order, with Ella Stevens quickest overall with a lap of 1:46.921. The British racer, supported by leading female driver Alice Powell, has excelled in karting, notably finishing runner-up in this year's KZ2 series.

Stevens pipped France's Lisa Billard to top spot by 0.092s, with American Payton Westacott just a further three-hundredths off the pace. Another British driver, Megan Bruce, was fourth on the timesheet, a quarter of a second adrift of Stevens.

Those four leading times were all posted in the morning session, and although the afternoon runs were marginally slower, the competitiveness of the leading quartet was again evident. Westacott, Bruce and Stevens in particular were covered by a mere 0.030s. It is almost certain that those four will be selected for an F1 Academy seat in 2026. 

"They've got a very, very strong chance," said Denver. "We know that our number one is always on-track performance, but we also ran a number of off-track assessments as well, including physical, cognitive and media assessments.

"There'll always be an emphasis, and the ratings will always be weighted to the on-track performance, but we'll also take into consideration some of those other elements as well.

"The stage that we've built with F1 Academy, and the visibility that comes with it, it's not a secret that you've got to be able to do all of the off-track activity. There's such a huge emphasis on the media side of things, the commercial partnerships, the activations, the engagement with fans. We're trying to really engage a wide range of different stakeholders here.

"Yes, the on-track bit is important, but equally these opportunities might create further networking and further opportunities for these drivers in the future. It's a bit of a dual career, really. It's the career planning and the opportunities that come with it, as well as showing you've got what it takes from a sporting excellence perspective."

Appreciably, the test was a resounding success, ensuring that whilst it might have been the first, it certainly will not be the last. Denver claimed it to be "one of the best things we've done from a talent identification perspective so far".

"I don't see any reason why we wouldn't continue to build on it," she continued. "If anything, even the drivers that maybe don't get an opportunity immediately, or if at all, they've still got the accolade of being invited to this test.

"Hopefully, they can use that to build on from an individual perspective as well. I think we will certainly look to refine it, but we will definitely run it again."

Aside from the leading names on the timesheet, what shone through for Denver was the fact that there were, as she described, "underdogs" who surprised, such as 16-year-old Lexi Danielsson, who, in May, won the opening round of the Porsche Sprint Challenge Scandinavia.

Danielsson was sixth in both the morning and afternoon sessions, and may yet have done enough to secure a seat for 2026. As Denver noted, whilst the Dane entered the test as something of "an unknown", she added that "she was one who we were like, 'Great, this is exactly why we're doing this test'.

"There would certainly have been a couple of drivers who might have been overlooked if we hadn't had the test, so overall, I think everybody's seen the benefit in it."