Formula Scout Top 50 Drivers of 2024: 20-11

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The penultimate part of our countdown of 2024’s best junior single-seater drivers features F2 down to F4

20. Victor Martins

Down 12 • Keeping confidence was key in wait for ART GP to hit form in F2

The 2023 teams’ champions ART Grand Prix struggled to nail Formula 2’s new car this year and it only became a competitive packaging in the second half of the season, which left Martins without a chance of fighting for the title.

His first points only arrived in round three, but there was still a lot of ground to be recovered before he and his team were able to fight at the front of the grid again.

In Monaco, he was fastest in his qualifying group to earn a feature race front row spot, but a clutch issue dropped him to the middle of the pack and he could only finish ninth. After a month-long break he won the Barcelona sprint race comfortably, but the actual performance turnaround of his team took place at Silverstone, round eight of 14.

After that, Martins became a regular podium contender, finishing second four times. Two of those came at the Hungaroring, a reward for a tyre management masterclass in both races. His other runner-up finishes were in feature races, then he claimed pole for the season finale in Abu Dhabi.

Even though it was a challenging year and potentially one that could mark his future, Martins repeated his 2023 mindset where he remained confident while results weren’t coming and this time keeping his head high helped contribute to his team’s recovery. In the end, he was seventh in the standings and 18 points away from matching his 2023 position of fifth.

19. Dino Beganovic

Up 6 • Swede prolonged F3 title ambitions that once seemed gone before rocking F2

Beganovic was the highest place returnee in the FIA Formula 3 Championship, so a title challenge was expected. But the season didn’t go his way.

The Ferrari junior began the year with pole, but followed that up with a puncture and a penalty for causing a crash in the sprint race then another non-score in the feature race as a gear issue dropped him to 29th on lap one. He bounced back by winning the next feature race in Melbourne, and after that said it was “not been where I want to be in terms of feeling” to be able to fight for victories as he embarked on a seven-race scoring run only two drivers bettered.

The run ended at the Red Bull Ring sprint race but he returned to the podium in the feature race, and he got another third place in the Hungaroring sprint race. Remarkably he kept himself in title contention, boosted by fending off Prema team-mate Gabriele Mini to win Spa-Francorchamps’ wet sprint race

“It’s been a tough season. It’s not been where I want to be,” Beganovic dwelled, as two points finishes in the Monza finale put him sixth in the standings. He had been fifth fastest across the season on single-lap pace and sixth on race pace, but had the third highest average finishing position of anyone.

Next, the Swede stepped down to Formula Regional to contest the Macau Grand Prix. An incident in the second qualifying session forced him to start in 15th, and over the two races he was able to recover to eighth. He then moved up to F2 with DAMS, and displayed blistering pace. He was fourth fastest in qualifying on debut at Losail, and finished the feature race in fifth. At Yas Marina Circuit he was again in the mix, just 0.161 seconds off pole, and came third and seventh in the races.

Beganovic’s race pace was on average the sixth best in the field this year, and over a single lap he was fourth fastest. He will join Hitech GP in F2 next year for a full campaign, and high pre-season expectations have been set once more.

18. Joshua Duerksen

New entry • Made the most of improving AIX Racing package in jump up to F2

Entering F2 from FRegional Europe and doing so with AIX Racing, it could have been expected that 2024 would be a year of learning for Duerksen, but it was way more than that.

The Paraguayan was soon on the pace and the Barcelona in-season test helped him and his team to make a step forward. At Imola, he qualified fifth and went on to finish third in the feature race with a flawless drive. He struggled in Monaco, but the trend was clearly upwards and at the Red Bull Ring he took a double points finish after being 0.008s shy of pole.

There were more performance gains after the summer break and Duerksen capitalised on them with more points and podiums. After a brilliant weekend at Monza where he was third and fifth, he won the sprint race in Baku, which he followed with fifth in the feature race. He saved the best for last, winning the season-ending feature race in Abu Dhabi from eighth on the grid. He was in third place by lap three, and having stopped early he took the lead once everyone had pitted.

His results lifted him from 19th to 10th in the standings, as well as his popularity at home, and he will stay with AIX in 2025.

17. Franco Colapinto

Down 2 • Argentinian national hero learned lots as an F2 and F1 rookie

2024 was an eventful year for Colapinto, as he went from F2 rookie to Formula 1 points scorer and Argentinian national hero.

He struggled for one-lap pace in the first three F2 rounds, a contrast to experienced team-mate Dennis Hauger. At that point, he also felt a bit overwhelmed by the scale of support coming from his home country and wanted to pay back with results.

Colapinto and MP Motorsport worked hard at the Barcelona in-season test to understand F2’s new car and extract more pace over one lap. It paid off, as he only missed the top 10 in one of the seven qualifying sessions that followed (and made the top five in fouer of them) before his surprise step up to F1 with Williams.

His F2 race results also improved considerably once he was starting further up the order. In round four at Imola he won the sprint race from second on the reversed grid, brilliantly holding off Paul Aron. That win was a much-needed confidence boost.

He later claimed second place finishes in the feature races at Barcelona and the Red Bull Ring, and five other top-five finishes meant he came ninth in the points despite missing over a quarter of the season. On a points-per-race basis, and with MP’s improving pace, he was on course to make the championship’s top five.

16. James Wharton

New entry • Finally delivered on potential in FREC after leaving Ferrari

Wharton’s first year since karting without the Ferrari Driver Academy’s backing was his most impressive, as he finally delivered on the potential which attracted Ferrari’s attention in the first place.

He certainly still had plenty of support, remaining in Nicolas Todt’s All Road Management stable, and racked up a lot of mileage at different circuits by racing in FRegional Middle East, FREC, the Macau GP, GB3 and FIA F3.

The step up to Formula 4 came in FRME, driving a Mumbai Falcons-branded but Prema-run car to warm up for his FREC campaign with the team. He took two podiums and sixth place in the standings, and was close to team-mate Rafael Camara.

In FREC, Wharton was fast but fragile at first. A mixture of bad luck, including a suspension breakage at Raidillon in Spa qualifying, and driver errors, such as spinning away the lead at Zandvoort, left him sixth in the points but with two poles after four rounds.

He knuckled down and took his maiden win at Mugello, which seemed to lift a weight from his shoulders. In the final four rounds he was only once off the podium and three more wins, including two at Barcelona, was enough to be championship runner-up.

Wharton was thrilled to get the chance to race at Macau, an opportunity which with ART GP, but after seventh place in the qualification race he crashed out the main race. He will race for the team in FIA F3 next year.

15. Louis Sharp

Up 22 • Hard-earned GB3 title highlighted impact of circuit experience on form

Sharp is one of few drivers who will enter 2025 having won single-seater titles in back-to-back years.

He followed up his 2023 British F4 crown with GB3 honours in 2024, and had plenty of competition not only in the title race but also from many others in the field when fighting for podiums and wins. It made his title a hard-earned one.

The season began at Oulton Park, where Sharp claimed pole for the first two races and converted them into a victory and a second place. He said his debut success provided instant momentum since the first victory is the hardest to achieve, and he retained the points lead through round two at Silverstone despite missing the podium.

At Spa, a brand new track for Sharp, he was third twice then dropped to third in the standings after retiring from race three when a rival misjudged a double pass attempt. Sharp had been on for at least fifth place, enough to have kept him atop the points.

Sharp had a bad qualifying session at the Hungaroring, another circuit outside of Britain that was new to him, and while he could only finish seventh in race one he was able to win race two by charging into the lead from fifth on the grid in the space of a lap. Fourth place in the reversed-grid race followed, putting him back in the championship lead.

It was a similar story at Zandvoort in the Netherlands, with Sharp qualifying third, then moving up and down the order through the changing conditions of race one before settling into fourth place. He retired from race two, and seventh place in race three meant he became the chaser once more.

GB3 returned to Britain following that, and Sharp returned to being the most competitive driver in the field. Two second places at Silverstone (the first of which put him back in the points lead) were followed by two poles and two wins at Donington Park then coming just shy of a double pole at Brands Hatch. He was squeezed off track on lap one of race one but still finished seventh, won race two, then pursued his title rivals home in the finale to become champion.

Next year he stays with Rodin Motorsport as he steps up to F3, and it will be interesting to see whether circuit experience impacts his form as heavily again.

14. Tuukka Taponen

New entry • FRegional newcomer took Middle East title and won in Europe

After a disappointing year in F4 with Prema, the Ferrari junior joined the competitive R-ace GP team for his FRegional graduation. He got his time in the catehory off to a great start as he convincingly beat a strong field, including more experienced rivals, to take five wins, five poles and the title in FRME.

There was a solid start too in FREC, and his season came alive once he won in round three at Zandvoort. At the Hungaroring he led lights-to-flag, and set the fastest lap, in both races and won from pole again at Mugello.

Over FREC’s summer break he made his FIA F3 debut with ART GP at Spa, and looked at home in tricky conditions. He will step up to the championship full-time with the team in 2025.

Both Taponen and R-ace seemed to lose their way slightly in the second half of the FREC season, with Taponen getting involved in incidents and retiring five times. He dropped to third in the standings, and came close to ending up in fourth.

At the Macau GP he qualified 20th after a crash, then a lap one collision in the qualification race put him 26th on the grid for the FIA FRegional World Cup-awarding main race. A storming drive to 10th showed what could have been.

Still, a title in the United Arab Emirates and a hard-fought third place in Europe is a brilliant return for a FRegional rookie.

13. Zane Maloney

Up 29 • Maturity earned Barbdian fourth in F2 standings and an FE seat

Maloney’s maturity stood out in 2024, both in F2 and with how he pursued opportunities elsewhere, and he drove with the ability to fight for the title. However he exited contention with a round to go, and skipped that final event to make his Formula E debut as a full-time driver there with Lola Yamaha Abt.

In F2 he had a Super Formula champion as a team-mate, yet scored 81% of Rodin’s points. Even taking respective levels of circuit experience into account, it was such a one-sided affair that it only further highlighted how well Maloney was driving and particularly when he did not have the fastest car underneath him.

He was the ninth-fastest driver on single-lap pace, but the fifth best in the field when it came to race pace and in the Bahrain season opener he came from eighth to win the sprint race (taking fastest lap on the way), then – having come 0.067 second short of pole – led all but the first few seconds of the feature race for a double win.

At Silverstone he was second in both races, and there were also feature race podiums in Melbourne and Monza. At the latter he took Rodin’s first F2 pole in over two years.

Two points-free weekends at the Hungaroring and in Baku, the latter down to his own errors and having tyres in worse conditions than his rivals by race-end, undid a season that should have kept Maloney on F1’s radar.

12. Deagen Fairclough

New entry • Broke records for wins, poles and podiums in British F4 domination

Records were broken by Fairclough as he romped to the British F4 title with Hitech as a sophomore, and he also had competitive showings abroad.

His year began in F4 UAE; his first ever races outside of Britain. He qualified seventh on debut in Abu Dhabi, and after keeping that position in race one finished second in the reversed-grid race two. A fourth place followed to sit fourth in the points.

However he struggled in qualifying at round two there, and had to charge up the order to finish seventh in race one. A clash in race two cost him another top-10 result as he got a penalty and had to pit, but that was a rare instance of Fairclough not getting it right in battle this year. There was a far more impressive rise to fourth in race three.

He escaped two big crashes at Dubai Autodrome, leaving the weekend with no points, but he returned to form in the final race of round four in Abu Dhabi and that continued into the finale where he rose back up to seventh in the standings.

While the results were not headline-grabbing, it was all crucial learning that was applied upon the return to Britain. Qualifying was crucial to avoiding being caught in scraps for position that could prove race-ending, and Fairclough took 15 poles out of 20. All but two were converted into victories, and in the season-opening race at Donington Park he won from third on the grid.

In the reversed-grid fixtures, Fairclough only once retired and had a net gain of 42 positions from where he started even when taking his non-finish (where he lost of the equivalent of 11 places) into account. Those races also contributed to his fastest lap tally of 19, and sum of 22 podiums from 30 races. Whenever wet weather hit, Fairclough was also fantastic.

11. Arvid Lindblad

Up 12 • Red Bull protege won in FRegional and F3 in charge up the ladder

Lindblad has Red Bull’s faith and backing like no other driver has since Max Verstappen entered F1, and while 2024 absolutely proved why he is a very exciting talent it was not a spellbinding year for the F4 graduate.

Prema ran the Anglo-Swede in FRME and then F3, and it took just two races for Lindblad to become a FRegional winner. But that came in a reversed-grid race, having qualified 15th. Finishing eighth in race three meant he left Abu Dhabi fourth in the standings, but qualifying put him on the back foot again through rounds two and three. He made no further outings, and fell to 13th in the points by season-end.

In F3 it took one race for Lindblad to win. He qualified ninth at Bahrain, putting him fourth on the reversed grid, and after initially dropping to fifth worked his way to the front. He took the lead with less than four laps to go, then built a 5.478s gap. Afterwards he said he “wasn’t too worried” about tyre degradation, and that the result gave him “a lot of confidence” against high level opposition.

Eighth place in the feature race followed, then in Melbourne he benefited from the reversed grid having qualified eighth. He was sprint race runner-up, but non-scored through lack of pace late on in the feature race. At Imola his qualifying form improved, going fourth fastest and beating his team-mates, which was converted into two points scores although he again faded late in the feature race.

Lindblad was 0.019s shy of the feature race front row in Monaco, and carefully held his fourth place throughout after contributing to a sprint race pile-up. Despite his deficiencies, the then-16-year-old was more consistent than most and sat fifth in the standings. So when he finally hit form, Lindblad looked like a de facto title contender.

At Barcelona he missed pole by 0.036s then was faultless as he dominated the feature race, was 0.084s off feature race pole at the Red Bull Ring but dropped from second to seventh as fading race pace remained an issue, then at a wet Silverstone qualified outside of the top 10 but had the speed to be at the front. He dominated the sprint race, and won a tricky feature race in changing conditions.

There were no more points for Lindblad after that though, being far off the pace and having a crash at the Hungaroring, spinning a team-mate and being off the pace at Spa and rising up the order but to no higher than 12th at Monza after qualifying badly once more. Next year he steps back down to FRegional to race in New Zealand as a winter warm-up for a step up to F2 with Campos Racing.