Photo: Colin McMaster/FIA F3
Jake Hughes will join KIC Motorsport for this weekend’s Formula Regional European Championship round at Mugello.
The 25-year-old finished seventh in FIA Formula 3 Championship this year with single-seater debutant team HWA Racelab, having spent the previous three seasons in GP3 and FIA European F3.
“[It was a] late call on Monday,” Hughes told Formula Scout.
“Helping out the guys there and keeps me in the seat before the Macau Grand Prix. And I?ve always wanted to drive Mugello!”
KIC Motorsport is run by Petri Lappalainen, whose son Konsta – the 2018 Formula 4 North European Zone champion – races for the team.
It ran Lappalainen’s former F4 NEZ rival Isac Blomqvist for the first five FREC rounds of the year, with a best finish of second place in his final race at Imola.
Former Red Bull junior and fellow Briton Dan Ticktum recently joined the championship with Van Amersfoort Racing, also in-part to assist the team.
He plans to join Hughes on the Macau Grand Prix grid this November, having won the FIA F3 World Cup title there for the last two years.
This year?s Macau GP is being run as a non-championship FIA F3 round, with the 10 teams that contested the inaugural season of the Formula 1 support series set to return.
It is not clear whether three-car line-ups will be required as per the championship?s regulations, with Hughes joining Liam Lawson as drivers confirmed to participate.
Sauber junior Lirim Zendeli, who withdrew from the season-ending FIA F3 Championship round in Sochi last weekend due to a administrative dispute with his Charouz Racing System team, and the injured Alex Peroni are both expected to miss the grand prix.