Photo: Top Speed
Niccolo Maccagnani dominated Formula 4 South East Asia’s finale at Sepang on September 20/21, as Alex Sawer was crowned.
Future Ferrari junior Maccagnani began his second weekend in car racing by dominating qualifying.
In Q1 he took race one pole by 0.348 seconds over Sawer, with Seth Gilmore 0.736s behind in third. The next three drivers were within 1.3s-1.6s of Maccagnani’s pace, and Thomas Lee in last was 5.069s off.
Maccagnani improved to 2m08.848s in Q2, claiming race three pole by 0.702s. Sawer beat Inigo Anton to second by 0.09s, and Gilmore trailed by 1.153s in fourth. Lee was further off the pace, rounding out the 10-car field with a best laptime 6.358s slower than Maccagnani’s. Since Gilmore missed out on the pole points, Sawer wrapped up the title.
Maccagnani made a great start to race one, while Sawer was slow but took a wide line into turn one to keep second. It took two laps for Maccagnani to build a one-second gap, and six more to break two seconds. In the remaining five laps the Pinnacle Motorsport driver pulled 5.508s clear for his first single-seater victory and to end Evans GP’s unbeaten 2025.
Gilmore was a lonely and distant third, and Anton and Ayrton Asdathorn fought over fourth on lap two. Anton then established himself ahead until the race’s final corner where he went very slow and was overtaken.
Debutant Rafael Vaessen tried going around Putera Hani Imran’s outside at turn one for sixth place on lap six, and they ran side-by-side through to turn four. Vaessen overtook on the inside there a lap later but was only ahead for one corner, and tried turn one again on lap 11 but Imran went deep to keep sixth.
Ben Nguyen attacked Joshua Berry for eighth on lap nine. He got ahead on the inside of turn one, Berry was back past through turn two, and Nguyen tried again at turn four. They clashed through turn five and Nguyen went off, but he ended the lap ahead as Berry spun at the final corner.
Anton had reversed-grid pole for race two. Maccagnani started fifth, and Imran stalled on the formation lap so was wheeled off.
Asdathorn got away slowly but held second until the rise to turn four where Gilmore got ahead. Maccagnani then dived down his inside at turn nine, which allowed Sawer to get past at turn 10 too.
On lap five, Maccagnani dived down Gilmore’s inside at the final corner but could not get ahead, nor at turn one. He took second before turn four, then had 1.58s to make up on Anton. The gap disappeared as Lee spun at turn 10 and the safety car was summoned on lap eight.
Maccagnani made another final corner dive on the restart lap and Anton ran way off at the exit, dropping to fourth and leaving Maccagnani to lead the last two laps.
Anton turned out to be severely unwell, so missed the 13-lap race three which Maccagnani won by a massive 19.645s. Sawer, with a 10s penalty, finished second.
Nguyen and Lee stalled, then the next moment of drama was on lap eight as Vaessen went into Asdathorn’s rear at turn one when trying to take fourth from him.
Results round-up
Race 1 (13 laps)
1 Niccolo Maccagnani Pinnacle Motorsport 28m12.016s
2 Alex Sawer Evans GP +5.508s
3 Seth Gilmore Evans GP +15.748s
4 Ayrton Asdathorn Star Performance +26.315s
5 Inigo Anton BlackArts Racing +26.715s
6 Putera Hani Imran BlackArts Racing +31.862s
7 Rafael Vaessen Evans GP +32.227s
8 Ben Nguyen BlackArts Racing +48.595s
9 Thomas Lee Evans GP +53.240s
10 Joshua Berry BlackArts Racing +1m12.063s
Pole: Maccagnani, 2m09.027s
Fastest lap: Maccagnani, 2m09.322s
Race 2 (12 laps)
1 Maccagnani 28m02.482s
2 Gilmore +2.246s
3 Sawer +2.906s
4 Anton +4.271s
5 Asdathorn +4.695s
6 Vaessen +6.373s
7 Imran +8.754s
8 Berry +9.548s
9 Nguyen +17.117s
Ret Lee
FL: Maccagnani, 2m09.456s
Race 3 (13 laps)
1 Maccagnani 28m15.800s
2 Sawer +19.645s
3 Gilmore +20.819s
4 Asdathorn +22.104s
5 Vaessen +22.869s
6 Berry +29.523s
7 Nguyen +29.788s
8 Imran +1m05.796s
9 Lee +1m05.953s
P: Maccagnani, 2m08.848s
FL: Maccagnani, 2m09.470s
Championship standings
1 Sawer 359 2 Gilmore 261 3 Anton 182 4 Maccagnani 158 5 Rishon Rajeev 156 6 Asdathorn 136 7 Nguyen 93 8 Zhongwei Wang 93 9 T Lee 93 10 Kyuho Lee 58