Academy Report: Sandro, Jade, Sasha and Dean in action
Four Academy drivers competed across three countries in another busy weekend of racing
Published
06 JUL 2026
Est. reading time
4 min
Four members of the Atlassian Williams F1 Team Driver Academy were in action across Europe and North America over the weekend.
From podium finishes and valuable points to more lessons at the sharp end of junior single-seater racing, it was another busy few days for our young talent.
Alessandro Giusti
Formula 3
Silverstone offered Sandro another chance to build momentum after a testing Spielberg outing, and the opening sessions showed genuine pace in the car.
Free practice saw some disruption from traffic and track limit deletions during the early representative laps, with Sandro ultimately settling into P12 as the field found its rhythm around the high-speed Silverstone layout. Qualifying was a step forward, with a P10 result giving him a useful grid position for the Sprint.
In the Sprint Race, Sandro made a strong start from the second row and ran inside the top five in the early laps, holding P3 before coming under sustained pressure from the chasing pack. James Wharton made a clean move around the outside at Brooklands on Lap 8, and Noah Strømsted followed through at Copse shortly after as Sandro struggled to maintain the pace of those ahead, eventually finishing P11.
The Feature Race proved difficult from the outset. An uncomfortable opening lap cost several positions, and Sandro found himself in the thick of a closely-matched midfield group. A five-second post-race penalty for a track limits infringement further impacted his final classification, dropping him to P13 in the results. It was a weekend that showed flashes of the pace that has been there all season - the task now is converting that into cleaner, penalty-free results when the paddock arrives at Spa.
Oleksandr Bondarev
E4 Championship
Sasha started his second E4 Championship campaign over the weekend
Sasha made his E4 Championship 2026 return at Vallelunga, kicking off a three-round campaign that runs alongside his Italian F4 programme with Prema Racing. It was an encouraging opening weekend for the Ukrainian, who banked valuable points across all three races at the Autodromo Piero Taruffi.
A P5 in the first qualifying session demonstrated competitive pace from the off, while a trickier second session left Sasha in P11 as the field proved closely matched around the short, technical Italian circuit. He made amends in the races, recovering well across all three encounters. A P5 in Race 1 set a solid tone, and Sasha managed tyre life and racecraft well across Races 2 and 3 to bring home P7 and P4 respectively - his best result of the weekend coming in the final race as he made progress through the order.
The E4 Championship continues with Round 2 at Le Castellet in France on 19 July.
Jade Jacquet
F1 Academy
Jade on track in the Pattern of Thought livery
Silverstone marked Jade's first F1 Academy weekend at one of the most iconic circuits on the calendar, and the French racer did so whilst running a one-off Claude Pattern of Thought livery.
The opening sessions were challenging, with Jade working to find her footing around Silverstone's high-speed layout during Practice and Qualifying, ending both sessions in P18.
The Reverse Grid Race brought additional adversity early on as Jade was among two drivers stranded momentarily at lights out before getting underway – and she spent the remainder of the race working to recover from the back of the field.
Sunday's Feature Race brought a more composed display. Jade worked her way steadily through the order across the course of the race to record a P13 finish, a five-place improvement on her Reverse Grid Race result and a sign of growing race craft and racepace as her rookie season develops.
Dean Hoogendoorn
USF Juniors
Dean continued his promising start to life in the USF Juniors with another encouraging showing at Mid-Ohio, racing with VRD Racing as the championship supported the IndyCar weekend in Lexington.
The Dutchman had made an immediate impression on his series debut at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park last time out, and carried that confidence into a second consecutive strong performance.
Having qualified in P5, race 1 saw Dean come home on the final step of the podium, before he would go one further in the second race.
Pushing from P7 on the grid, Dean, in just his second weekend in open-wheel racers, crossed the line in P2, helping his team take a 1-2 finish.
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