Inside Freddie Slater’s stunning weekend that kicked off GB3’s new era

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Freddie Slater is racing part-time in GB3, but has already made a mark with a dominant display at Silverstone

GB3 entered a new era at Silverstone last month as it debuted its new Tatuus MSV GB3-025 car. But it was another debut that stole the headlines, as Hillspeed driver Freddie Slater won the first two races of the season. While GB3 has had bigger winning margins in the past at the track than what Slater achieved, it was the advantage he enjoyed over the rest of the field for the entire weekend that raised eyebrows.

Slater’s pace-setting form throughout pre-season testing suggested he was the likely driver to beat at round one. Some in the paddock felt the part-timer held a 0.2-second advantage on outright pace coming into the weekend, but it soon became clear once the action got underway that he had more time in his pocket than had been anticipated.

After completing two warm-up laps at the beginning of GB3’s new two-part qualifying, Slater moved to the top of the leaderboard with his first flying lap, a 1m52.750s. Nobody else could challenge it in the first session, and Slater made two further improvements claim race one pole by a huge 0.556s. The gap between second and 10th place was 0.586s.

Slater lowered the pace three more times in the second qualifying session to pick up race two pole, leading the competition by 0.8s until Rodin Motorsport’s Alex Ninovic halved the deficit in the closing stages. Slater again earned pole through his first flying lap, and the personal best of 1m51.647s he set after lap was a GB3 track record on Silverstone’s Grand Prix layout.

While he wouldn’t be drawn on whether the size of the gap had surprised him, Slater did take encouragement from it.

“We knew we had a good pace, we just didn’t know how much of it we had,” Slater revealed to Formula Scout. “We made a few [car set-up] adjustments and we cranked it up in qualifying. We were on it in the early laps, which was key in case of red flags, and I just cracked on with the job and put some laps down.

Slater’s race one pace

“The first session the track was a bit green from the [British] GTs. They put quite a lot of rubber down and there were a lot of marbles, so it made the track quite dirty and there was only one line. It cleaned up, and also the fuel load was coming down for session two so that’s when the car was [at its] fastest.”

Having resisted pressure from JHR Developments’ fast-starting Noah Lisle through the opening two corners of race one, Slater built a 1.8s lead on the first lap. He then showed remarkable consistency to go quicker on each of his next nine laps before backing off slightly on the final two tours to take the chequered flag seven seconds clear of Lisle.

“The start was good,” Slater reflects. “A completely different procedure for all the drivers, because it’s a new car. The tow was quite effective into Maggotts and Becketts, quite a strong headwind, so Noah nearly got alongside me. I got a really good exit and that was the race-defining moment if I’m being honest – I broke the tow and cracked on from there.”

As in previous seasons, GB3 drivers are restricted to two sets of tyres across qualifying and three races during each weekend. With races one and two extended to 25 minutes for 2025, tyre management has become a more significant factor.

“[I was] definitely managing the tyres in some aspect to help ourselves in races two and three,” Slater says. “It’s a bigger tyre compared to what we had last year, it’s similar to what we have in Formula Regional Europe but a different attitude the way it handles on this car, so it’s been another thing to get my head around.

“But it was just good fun out there, I wasn’t really looking in my mirrors or at the gap, I was just trying to keep going in a sensible way while managing [the tyres] as well.”

It would have been easy for Slater to rest on his laurels a bit on Saturday evening, knowing he had pace in hand on his rivals going into Sunday’s two contests. But he still felt there was room for improvement – and so it proved, as his second triumph was even more dominant.

Slater’s race two pace

Following an early safety car period, Slater pulled out a huge 10s lead over Lisle – who was again best of the rest – before the safety car boards were displayed in the final sector on the penultimate lap, and the race finished under yellow flag conditions.

“I had a good start, they were three-wide into Maggotts and Becketts [behind me], and then I got a really good exit,” he said after victory.

“We had an early safety car [period], and I managed to open up the gap again afterwards – I had a really good restart as well.

“I made a slight improvement overnight which made the gap even bigger. The wind was slightly different to yesterday, so the track was in a slightly different condition, very dirty off-line especially. Considering we had two safety car [periods], the gap we pulled out was pretty good compared to yesterday. People are going to catch up sooner rather than later so I’ve got to keep my head down.”

BRDC British F4/BRDC British F3/GB3’s biggest winning margins

He claimed race two’s fastest lap by 0.565s, and Lisle’s best was 1.085s off Slater’s pace. Had the race stayed green to the end, Slater was on course for the third-largest winning margin since the series began as BRDC British Formula 4 in 2013, and beat the biggest achieved with GB3’s old car: Luke Browning’s 10.258s victory in its first race at Oulton Park in 2022.

In the reversed-grid finale, Slater worked his way up from 11th to seventh early on, despite losing ground on lap one when having to brake to avoid an incident between Rodin’s Abbi Pulling and Xcel Motorsport’s Dion Gowda.

But he was then involved in a collision with Hitech GP’s Nikita Johnson as he tried to gain another place, and ultimately finished 13th.

“I couldn’t really get away from the [chaos] wherever I went,” he says. “Turn one, an unavoidable incident when we were four-wide. I don’t know where else I could have gone at that point, obviously the safest route if I was fighting for a championship would have been to stay behind, but the gap was there.

“Then on the [Hamilton] Straight I got a really good run but somebody came [spinning] across to the right side [and I had to brake hard]. Hopefully everybody is okay, which is the main thing.

“The contact with Johnson, I’m not sure what happened, but it’s something I’ll review and see what I could have done differently to avoid it. I think we had a target on our backs after what happened in the first two races.

“There was a bit of time in the race. We had quite a long safety car [period], so there was quite a bit of time to understand how the tyres were working, with more [safety car] interventions and also in the dirty air. Overall, we have learned a lot, the team has learned a lot with the new car as well. It’s been a good weekend of learning.”

Slater will return to GB3 action for round three at Spa-Francorchamps at the end of May. His main focus remains FRegional Europe, and he’s already impressed at a higher level with a podium on debut in an FIA Formula 3 cameo at Bahrain in April.

“Times like these are where you realise why you put the effort in,” he relates. “All that winter preparation, which we do with my management team, my coach, my family – it’s where it all pays off. We had a good start to the season in the UAE [coming second in FRegional Middle East] and now we’ve had a good start in Britain at Silverstone, so I couldn’t have asked for much more, but we’ve got to try and build on it.

“It’s been super positive overall. We’ve been able to switch in on in qualifying which I’ve got to try and do for the rest of the year in all the categories. We know it’s not going to be that easy, everyone is going to catch up in any category, so I’ve just got to keep my head down and see what we can do.

“I wish there were more [FIA F3 Championship] opportunities, but I’m fully focused on FRegional and GB3.”