Planning for F4's future

The FIA’s entry-level category was on the agenda yesterday as discussions to define its future evolution took place in Turin

Two years after the launch of the first F4 championship, FIA President Jean Todt and key series personnel met on the opening day of this year’s FIA Sport Conference in Turin to discuss the future evolution of the FIA’s entrylevel category across a range of topics, including cost, safety and growth.

With 12 national championships being contested this year around the world, the gathering emphasised the need to ensure that the cost of competition is balanced across the various series and that they remain so moving forward.

One of the key features of F4 is in educating drivers and giving them ideal experience to move up the pyramid of single-seater racing. To that end, the principle to introduce an education

programme has been agreed between the ASNs who run F4 championships and the FIA.

Setting the standard for junior racing worldwide is an important goal for the FIA with F4, and the group looked at ways in which the racing format can be standardised across the series, and also how amending the format can improve general safety and reduce the need for safety car deployment.

Finally the seminar looked at some aspects away from the race track, most notably in the global branding of F4 and how it is presented to the drivers and to the public around the world.

As F4 is the starting point for the single seater stars of the future, the next stage of evolution will also include an emphasis on the community of young drivers, connecting them with each other both within their championships and globally. This forms part of the FIA’s ongoing work to build a consistent pathway of progression for drivers in the single-seater pyramid.