Williams Racing Driver Academy Line-up Confirmed for 2025

Our stars of tomorrow all make a step up in their careers, find out more...

Published

24 JAN 2025

Est. reading time

3 min

Williams Racing is proud to confirm the 2025 line-up of the Williams Racing Driver Academy, with the stars of tomorrow all making a step up in their careers.

The Driver Academy has gone from strength-to-strength in recent years, adding several up-and-coming talents and seeing each driver further their development.

Building on the Academy’s proud tradition of supporting young drivers, which most recently saw Franco Colapinto graduate to a full-time Formula 1 seat, the Academy will continue to offer best-in-class support to drivers through every stage of the motorsport ladder.

After his F1 weekend appearance in Abu Dhabi when he drove the FW46 in Free Practice for Williams, Luke Browning will make his full-time debut in FIA Formula 2 with Hitech GP for the 2025 season. This follows a strong 2024 campaign in Formula 3, achieving two Feature Race wins in Bahrain and Austria, then securing a seat in F2 for the final three races of the season, where he scored points on debut.

Lia Block will continue to represent the team for the 2025 F1 Academy season, racing with ART Grand Prix. Her debut year in open-wheel racing saw her make progress every time she hit the track, achieving fourth-place finishes in both races at the Singapore Grand Prix.

Alessandro Giusti will be stepping up to FIA Formula 3 with MP Motorsport following a hard-fought fourth-place finish in the Formula Regional European Championship last year. Achieving wins at Imola and Paul Ricard, plus five podium finishes, he will look to continue this positive trajectory into 2025.

Oleksandr Bondarev’s promising performances in karting and Formula 4 have earned him a seat with PREMA in Italian and UAE F4 for the 2025 season. He has seen multiple successes in his career so far, being crowned CIK-FIA European Champion OKJ in 2023 and taking home the WSK Champions Cup in 2024, before stepping up to Italian F4 with PREMA Racing from Barcelona onwards.

Four of our Academy drivers will continue in karting for 2025. Sara Matsui, who completed her first season of OKNJ racing in Europe last year and made the transition to OKN, will compete in the OK class for 2025. New additions to the Academy, Dean Hoogendoorn and Will Green, will compete in the OKJ series, while Lucas Palacio will race in OKJ–N.

“We’re excited to confirm our Williams Racing Driver Academy drivers for this year, and proud to showcase the amount of talent and promise in each of our drivers," Sven Smeets, Sporting Director, commented.

"The Academy is central to our commitment to shaping the future of our sport, supporting them both on and off the track. We’re looking forward to following all the drivers’ progress throughout this 2025 season.”

Full line-up:

Luke Browning (UK, age 22) – F2, Hitech GP Lia Block (USA, age 18) – F1 Academy, ART Grand Prix Alessandro Giusti (France, age 18) – F3, MP Motorsport Oleksandr Bondarev (Ukraine, age 15) – Italian and UAE F4, PREMA Sara Matsui (Japan, age 14) – OK class karting Dean Hoogendoorn (Netherlands, age 12) – OKJ karting Will Green (UK, age 11) – OKJ karting Lucas Palacio (USA, age 11) – OKJ-N karting

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