FREC post-season tests end with Craigie and Lindblom to the fore

Photo: ACI Sport

Mercedes-AMG F1 junior Kenzo Craigie finished the third and final Formula Regional Europe post-season test with the fastest time of the day.

Van Amersfoort Racing’s Scott Lindblom pipped Craigie to the top spot in the afternoon by 0.086s, but the second session proved significantly slower, with not a single driver improving on their morning best.

Craigie was the first driver to dip below 1m26s after 18 minutes of the morning session, before his R-ace GP team-mate Oleksandr Bondarev took over at the top.

Over the following half-hour, the times tumbled as the MP Motorsport trio of Dries Van Langendonck, Rocco Coronel and Kasper Schormans, Lindblom and Prema’s Ty Fisher took turns at the front.

Van Langendonck looked to have set the benchmark with his 1m25.093s at the hour mark, before Craigie returned with five consecutive sub 1m25.5s laps, putting the top spot beyond reach with a 1m25.066s.

Van Langendonck and Coronel locked out the second and third positions for MP, ahead of Lindblom and their team-mate Schormans.

Bondarev finished sixth, ahead of Rodin Motorsport’s Alex Ninovic and Miguel Costa, back with CL Motorsport in place of Reno Francot after his run with Rodin the day before.

Jensen Burnett was a surprise 10th fastest having not taken part in Tuesday’s sessions. The Canadian, who has been racing in Spanish and Italian Formula 4 this season after moving up from karts, had taken over the Rodin entry piloted on Tuesday by Costa.

Alexandre Munoz returned to ART Grand Prix in place of Edu Robinson.

RPM was also ringing the changes as Marcus Saeter, one of the surprises of the past season with G4 Racing, and Teo Borenstein, currently second in F4 Central Europe, joined Emily Cotty, a constant in the testing game of musical chairs. Felipe Reijs and Kabir Anurag made way for the new boys.

Lindblom dominated the afternoon session, improving the fastest time three times in four laps in the first 15 minutes. Nobody would beat his best of 1m26.025s, although Craigie went out at the end to try, ultimately falling short by 0.086s.

Rodin’s Ninovic and the impressive Burnett took third and fourth, the Canadian setting exactly the same time as Costa in fifth.

After six days of official post-season testing the prospects for 2027 look extremely strong, with some highly impressive rookies and some strong sophomore campaigners looking to do battle.