Lammers leads 36-car field in practice for Spanish F4’s Aragon opener

Photo: Spanish F4

MP Motorsport’s Rene Lammers was fastest in practice at Motorland Aragon for Spanish Formula 4’s season opener, which has attracted a 36-car field.

The half-hour session featured plenty of action, and TC Racing’s Santino Panetta was quickest after the first five minutes.

Campos Racing’s Noah Monteiro lowered the pace to 2m03.573s after eight minutes, then MP’s Hudson Shwartz set a 2m02.358s a minute later. At the 10-minute mark he was down to fifth, as Campos’s Thomas Strauven and Matus Ryba lapped in the 2m01s and Sacha Van’t Pad Bosch (Tecnicar Motorsport) and Jan Przyrowski (Campos) also beat him.

Przyrowski was first to to lap sub-2m01s, then was immediately beaten by a 2m00.625s from Strauven. Lammers was briefly third, then Campos’s Miguel Costa and Monteiro occupied the position.

TC’s Alfio Spina and Shwartz were next to break into 2m00s territory, and approaching practice’s halfway point Monteiro lowered the pace to 1m59.776s. Strauven and Przyrowski improved to 2m00.519s and 2m00.629s in third, before Schwartz beat both with a 2m00.458s.

Strauven returned to the top by setting a 1m59.533s, and Costa also beat Monteiro by 0.045 seconds.

There was more change with 12 minutes to go, as Przyrowski briefly usurped Strauven before he responded with a 1m59.262s lap.

Van’t Pad Bosch, team-mate Andrej Petrovic and Shwartz demoted Costa to sixth with just under 11 minutes remaining, and there was a surprise name leading the way entering the final 10 minutes as Campos’s Vivek Kanthan shot to the top with a 1m59.097s.

Lammers rose up the order to second with nine minutes to go, posting a 1m59.154s, but Strauven almost instantly bettered him by 0.027s. At this point, 0.841s covered the top 15.

Przyrowski laid down a new benchmark two-and-a-half minutes later, a 1m58.828s putting him 0.209s clear of the improving Kanthan. Petrovic and Costa both set sub-1m59.1s laps to be third and fourth with five minutes to go, and shortly after the session’s fastest lap arrived: a 1m58.656s from Lammers.

Sector four was the only one he was quickest in, while Przyrowski was fastest through the first and third but ended the session in eighth. Few drivers improved late on, although Monlau Motorsport’s Francisco Monarca did jump to ninth at the chequered flag.

Technical issues led to Jean-Paul Karras, Edu Robinson, Christopher Feghali, Alex Powell and Santiago Baztarrica being black flagged, with Robinson getting a stop-go penalty before getting black flagged again. Six other drivers went on to be black flagged, including Lammers.

In the days leading up to the season opener, Tecnicar announced a four-car line-up completed by Wiktor Dobrzanski and Nacho Tunon. They came 22nd and 25th in the 2025 Spanish F4 Winter Championship, while Van’t Pad Bosch was 20th.

Mercedes-AMG Formula 1 junior and 2025 F4 Middle East runner-up Powell is driving for Sainteloc Racing, but it has not been confirmed if he will race beyond round one, while Drivex School’s six-car Aragon line-up has been completed by Artem Severiukhin who came 10th in Iberia’s Formula Winter Series.

Free practice results