Renowned British single-seater team Double R Racing has today, Tuesday, 1st December, officially confirmed it will join the Duo BRDC Formula 4 Championship from next year and will field three of the category’s brand new Tatuus-Cosworth cars.
Fresh from a superb podium finish at the annual Suncity Group Macau Formula 3 Grand Prix eight days ago, the Woking team – which also competes in the FIA Formula 3 European Championship and MSA Formula – is relishing the prospect of joining the MotorSport Vision-run BRDC F4 Category.
With the introduction of the new Cosworth-powered Tatuus MSV F4-016 a couple of months ago, BRDC F4 has taken a big step closer to Formula 3 levels of performance and Double R team boss Anthony ‘Boyo’ Hieatt says the series is the “natural replacement” for the British F3 Championship which ended in 2014.
“We’re delighted to join BRDC F4 in readiness for next season and will be running three cars in our first year”, said Hieatt, “Drivers are raving about the new car and they’re right to – it’s fast, very good from an engineering and team perspective to work with and also pretty close to F3, which is obviously perfect for drivers looking to progress up the ladder.
“With the new car, BRDC F4 has become the natural replacement for British F3 and everyone at Double R is looking forward to joining an MSV run championship. We’ve never worked with Jonathan Palmer’s organisation before, but I have known Giles Butterfield [MSV Group Operations Manager] a long time and he’s done a great job with the series.”
Since the demise of British F3 a year ago, Double R has been concentrating on its commitments in the FIA Formula 3 European Championship and also the inaugural season of the MSA Formula series which debuted back in April on the British Touring Car Championship support package. Achieving two wins and seven other podiums in the first year, Double R enjoyed a strong maiden campaign.
Now, with the addition of BRDC F4 involvement to its operations, the squad has a very smooth ladder of progression from national UK motorsport into international competition and team principal Hieatt believes the refreshed MSV category will tick all of the boxes for young drivers.
The 2016 calendar has already been confirmed with 24 races across eight weekends, taking in venues such as Oulton Park, Brands Hatch Grand Prix Circuit, Silverstone Grand Prix Circuit and Donington Park. Running as a co-headline category with the British GT Championship, as British F3 used to, there will also be an overseas visit to Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium next July.
“The calendar looks good, we always love racing at tracks like Oulton Park and Silverstone and it’s good for the drivers to have a circuit like Spa on there too”, added Hieatt, “It’ll be a good challenge coming up against teams we haven’t raced against before, and also continuing the friendly rivalry we’ve had over many years in F3 with the likes of Fortec and Carlin. We can’t wait to get going.”
Double R will be in a position to confirm the first of its BRDC F4 drivers in the coming weeks.
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