Ladder to F1: Eight hot prospects you need to keep an eye on in 2025

A new year of racing action will soon be underway, and the junior categories are bursting at the seams with talent.?

What’s more, that pesky F1 bottleneck which had built up for young hotshots has been removed emphatically, with Kimi Antonelli, Oliver Bearman and Gabriel Bortoleto among the fresh F1 2025 faces. So, as the next generation battle to follow in their footsteps, here are the talents you should watch extra closely in 2025…

Eight standout talents in the battle for F1 stardom

8. Brando Badoer

A young racer who has perhaps flown under the radar, 18-year-old Brando Badoer – son of former Ferrari F1 driver Luca Badoer – is someone not to be slept on, and the impression he made on McLaren proves it.

Effectively on trial with the McLaren driver programme in 2024, Badoer earned himself a full-time spot in the academy which has produced Lewis Hamilton and Lando Norris, after a Formula Regional European Championship [FRECA] campaign which featured seven podiums and a P5 finish in the championship.

Now, the Italian steps up to Formula 3 and has landed one of the coveted seats with Prema, which very well could provide the base for a title challenge.

7. Tuukka Taponen

Joining Badoer on the 2025 F3 grid will be Ferrari prospect Tuukka Taponen, who carries with him the momentum of his first single-seater championship title secured in 2024, that being the Formula Regional Middle East crown.

A driver rarely far from the sharp end of the grid in any category he takes a crack at, Taponen has watched the likes of Charles Leclerc and Oliver Bearman walk the path to Formula 1 with Ferrari backing, and will look to keep himself on said track with an F3 title push.

After turning heads in his F3 taster last season with ART at Spa, Taponen now has a full campaign with the respected French outfit to come.

6. Freddie Slater

Now, we reach our first – and in fact only – young driver on this list without an F1 team affiliation, though it is safe to say that if young Freddie Slater did not continue to insist on this approach, someone would have snapped him up by now.

Last year, Slater broke the victory record held by Mercedes-bound Kimi Antonelli in the Italian F4 series, winning a remarkable 15 of the 20 races, as well as claiming 11 pole positions. He also won the F4 UAE Championship and finished runner-up in the Euro 4 standings to add further gloss to a stunning campaign.

Next up for the 16-year-old Brit in 2025 is FRECA, and remaining with Prema, he is going to take some stopping.

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5. Oliver Goethe

Over at Red Bull, it seems driver programme boss Helmut Marko has already selected his future star (more on who that is later), but the Austrian squad has another promising talent in their ranks who could soon be knocking on F1’s door.

That driver is Germany’s Oliver Goethe, who despite a rather underwhelming 2024 campaign in F3, made the step up to F2 impressively and held on to his Red Bull ties.

Goethe contested the final four rounds of last year’s F2 campaign and recorded three top-10 finishes with a best of P4, and after Red Bull team principal Christian Horner seemingly guaranteed a 2026 vacancy at Racing Bulls with Yuki Tsunoda to move on, Goethe will look to force himself into the conversation for that seat.

4. Dino Beganovic

But, if Goethe’s adaptation to F2 was impressive, then Dino Beganovic’s impact was extraordinary.

The Ferrari junior would have been expecting more than P6 in the 2024 F3 standings, but he gave a timely reminder of his abilities when he joined the F2 grid for the last two rounds, making the podium in Abu Dhabi and never finishing lower than P10.

At a time where it looked like the Swede’s window to impress Ferrari was closing, he thrust it back open, and will be sensing a shot at the F2 title in 2025 with Hitech.

3. Rafael C?mara

But, as we move into the podium places on this talent-filled list, we must return to F3 where in 2025, we will find Brazil’s Rafael C?mara.

Ferrari must regularly be breaking out their best Jeremy Clarkson smug face considering the collection of young talent they possess, with?C?mara arguably the pick of the bunch.

The teenager takes to a new category like a duck does to water, as in his single-seater career, he is yet to finish lower than P5 in a championship table and took the 2024 FRECA crown, winning seven races and recording 12 podiums overall to make mincemeat of the competition.

Trident produced the 2024 F3 champion in Leonardo Fornaroli and as C?mara readies for his F3 campaign with the Italian squad, why break the habit of a lifetime? Expect to see C?mara gunning for that title.

2. Gabriele Mini

With rookie drivers in fashion again for F1 teams, C?mara will be keeping one eye just squinting open to the prospect of a 2026 seat, but Gabriele Mini will have both eyes wide open, and may not even need to wait until next year.

Alpine were among the cluster of teams to pledge their allegiance to youth by promoting Jack Doohan from reserve driver to Pierre Gasly’s team-mate, though Alpine’s advisor Flavio Briatore has already made it clear that he will not hesitate to change the driver line-up if Doohan does not perform.

And so, Alpine junior Mini – who steps up to F2 full-time after narrowly missing out on the F3 crown – will be looking to convince Alpine that he is the better option to field alongside Gasly.

He will face competition from recently-signed reserve Franco Colapinto and Paul Aron, but as he continues his Prema association, Mini only needs to look at their 2024 F2 line-up of Antonelli and Bearman – both now F1 drivers – to know that he can place himself firmly in the Alpine conversation.

1. Arvid Lindblad

But, our number one spot goes to British teenager Arvid Lindblad, who has already been earmarked as Red Bull’s next potential “champion” and as such, is in pole position to replace Tsunoda at Racing Bulls for F1 2026.

Exactly why Helmut Marko rates Lindblad so highly was made quite clear in 2024, as he challenged for the F3 crown in his rookie season despite skipping the FRECA stage altogether.

And this year, Lindblad can look forward to an F2 seat with Campos – the team with which Isack Hadjar finished runner-up in the 2024 standings and secured his promotion to Racing Bulls – plus private tests in F1 machinery, as Red Bull look to ready their next chosen one.

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