Photo: Dutch Photo Agency / Red Bull
Campos Racing has announced that one of its drivers for the 2026 FIA Formula 3 season will not contest the first pre-season test, but it will still field three cars.
Red Bull junior Ernesto Rivera, who will race for Campos this year, will not be in the cockpit at Barcelona on Febrary 10-12 and Patrick Heuzenroeder has been called up to drive his car.
At the start of 2026, Rivera raced in Formula Regional Oceania and in the final round at Highlands Motorsport Park he had a crash after the bridge section in the second race nine days ago that led to him missing the season’s final two races. The 17-year-old Mexican is still recovering from bak pain and has not been cleared to be back driving on track.
There were two podiums and a fastest lap for Rivera in the first two rounds of the FRegional Oceania season, and while he began round three with a pole he only had one top-10 finish in the next two rounds and came 11th in the standings. Rivera steps up to F3 after coming fourth in Eurocup-3 with Campos and ninth in FRegional Middle East last year.
Heuzenroeder will be in Campos’s Eurocup-3 line-up for 2026, and the Formula 1-supporting FIA F3 Championship is the next target for the 20-year-old Australian in his career. He was GB3 runner-up and fourth in FRegional Oceania last year, winning a race in both. It was his third GB3 campaign, having done two rounds in 2023 then coming 12th in the 2024 season.