Formula 3 has confirmed that DAMS will join the grid in place of Jenzer for the next three-year cycle.

The move sees the French outfit expand its operation beyond only a single series focus for the first time since ex-Formula 1 driver Charles Pic bought the team in 2022, when it ceased operating in Formula E to leave Formula 2 as its only project.

DAMS was last present at the third tier of motorsport in 2017 when it withdrew from the GP3 series.

Founded by Jean-Paul Driot and Rene Arnoux in 1989, DAMS has largely operated in single-seater championships and been a mainstay of F2 since its previous guise as GP2 began in 2005, winning the 2019 teams championship with Sergio Sette Camara and Nicholas Latifi.

Since its formation out of the ashes of the GBDA team in which Driot and Arnoux also had an interest, it has earned drivers’ titles in Formula 3000 and GP2 with Erik Comas, Olivier Panis, Jean-Christophe Boullion, Romain Grosjean, Davide Valsecchi and Jolyon Palmer.

It also enjoyed success in the Formula Renault 3.5 championship, and A1 Grand Prix.

Pic bought out Olivier and Gregory Driot, who had assumed control of the team following their father’s death in 2019.

He said: “We’re thrilled to have been selected to enter a Formula 3 team from next season for the next three years.

DAMS previously competed in GP3

Photo by: Motorsport Images

“This is a logical step for us as we’re already competing in F2, and this latest endeavour means we can develop younger drivers from our F3 programme into our F2 team, using systems we have put in place to support and train drivers on the technical side.

“The main objective of this first campaign is to develop a competitive car, like we’ve done in F2 this year.

“Starting the championship with the arrival of a brand-new car is great timing, as we can reuse our methods that we’ve developed over the years.

“We’ve put together a very experienced technical team with proven engineers alongside good mechanics, so I’m confident we can deliver strong performances in Formula 3 over the coming seasons and be a contender at the front of the field.”

All of the other nine existing teams will remain on the grid for the coming cycle.
Championship CEO Bruno Michel added: “For the next three-year cycle, we have retained nine of our current teams.

“Their level of professionalism and expertise guarantee the best preparation for the young drivers who aspire to progress to the highest levels of motorsport.

“To complete the grid, we welcome DAMS to the list of selected teams. We know them very well from the FIA Formula 2 Championship. Their pedigree and level of performance make them the perfect addition to the F3 field.

“Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Andreas Jenzer and everyone at Jenzer Motorsport for their commitment to Formula 3 since the beginning of the category.

Jenzer bows out after a long stint in the GP3/F3 championship, having won its first race in 2010

Photo by: Motorsport Images

“They have left their mark in the championship, and I completely respect their decision to focus now on new challenges.”

Jenzer won the very first round of the GP3 championship with Pal Varhaug in 2010, when it finished third in the teams’ standings.

That result was matched in 2017, but results were harder to come by following the merger with European Formula 3 to form the current FIA F3 championship in 2019.

Taylor Barnard became the Swiss squad’s final F3 race winner in the Spa feature contest in 2023.

The 2024 Bathurst 1000 was somewhat of a slow burner with the pole-sitting Erebus Motorsport Chevrolet Camaro of reigning Supercars champion Brodie Kostecki and Todd Hazelwood leading for the duration. 

It had appeared that the 1000 km distance was set to run under green flags for the duration until Matt Payne lost control of his Grove Racing Ford Mustang at The Cutting, resulting in the sole safety car intervention and a 27-lap sprint to the flag. 

This put the Triple Eight Camaro of Broc Feeney and Jamie Whincup on the tail of the leaders, with the two lead cars quickly gapping the field. 

With neither Kostecki nor Feeney putting a wheel wrong, it was the Erebus car that took the flag by 1.3496s.

“I can’t believe it, this guy here [Hazelwood] did a stellar job all weekend,” said Kostecki after giving Erebus its second 1000 win – the other triumph coming in 2017 with David Reynolds and Luke Youlden.

“We had a really good car for the middle stint but as soon as the clouds came over we lost a little speed. They were 32 shootout laps [at the end].

The race gets under way at Bathurst

Photo by: Supercars

“You can bring your pace back a little bit and lose it a little bit.”

It was a deserving result for Kostecki, who stood aside for the opening two rounds of the championship and for Hazelwood, who stepped into the #1 Camaro at the Bathurst 500 and at Albert Park, and whose previous best result in a Supercars race was third place.

“Unbelievable, I think I am hallucinating. I am lost for words!” said an emotional Hazelwood.

“’Bush’ [Kostecki] is an absolute legend. It has been a tough year but when you win Bathurst, it makes up for everything. No better bloke to do it with, he is a wizard around the Mountain.”

Most of the race was an arm wrestle between Chevrolet’s two dominant squads, Erebus and T8. Kostecki, who started from pole position for the second year in a row, controlled the opening 28-lap stint, when he stretched away from Triple Eight’s Broc Feeney, then the third, when Feeney’s co-driver Jamie Whincup was in the blue Camaro for two consecutive 28-lap stints.

At one stage the two teams occupied the first five positions, with Jack Le Broc and Jayden Ojeda running fourth in the second Erebus Camaro, and then Craig Lowndes. The veteran drove careful first and third stints in Triple Eight’s wildcard entry, which started from grid 18, before handing over to co-driver Cooper Murray – who was later penalised for a breach of the safety car procedure.

When Le Brocq lost time in the final pitstop, dropping him from the top five, the race was down to Kostecki, Feeney and Brown, leading a pack of Ford Mustangs – Tickford’s Cameron Waters and James Moffat, Chaz Mostert and Lee Holdsworth (Walkinshaw Andretti United), and Richie Stanaway and Dale Wood (Grove Racing).

The Payne/Tander car was the only retirement of the 2024 Bathurst 1000

Photo by: Supercars

When the final dash came, Brown’s speed was just not there. He and co-driver Pye were in the hunt for the podium but not much more, eventually finishing 13.6404s behind the winner.

Fourth came the best of the Fords. Waters mounted a strong recovery from his and Moffat’s problems, to hold off Mostert and 2023 winner Stanaway – who still does not have a confirmed seat for 2025.

The lack of Safety Cars for more than 125 laps meant that any small errors were severely punished. Waters hung onto the leaders until a trip up an escape road, losing eight positions before he recovered. Garth Tander did a similar thing in one of Payne’s Ford, dropping him five places.

Dick Johnson Racing’s Anton De Pasquale looked like a contender to lead the Ford challenge until he dropped around 30 seconds with a troublesome brake change during a pitstop.

Andre Heimgartner, whose Brad Jones Racing crew managed to get only 20 litres into the Chevrolet at the first fuel stop, 100 short of what was intended. The car looked to have top-six speed but with no mid-race yellow flag periods, was doomed to finish back in 16th place.

As a result of his third place Brown, who brought an 189-point lead to Mount Panorama, now leads by 204 points, with 2538 to the 2334 for Feeney, who moves to second. Mostert is third on 2313 from Waters (2074), James Golding (1718) and Payne (1659).

The next round of the Supercars Championship will be on the Gold Coast on 25-27 October for two 250km races around the tight streets of Surfers Paradise.

Supercars Bathurst 1000 Results

Nyck de Vries believes the penalty that cost him his first Super Formula points finish at Fuji is a result of a “domestic-specific” interpretation of the rules governing contact.

In his third and final stand-in appearance of the season for Team Impul, ex-Formula 1 racer de Vries finished eighth on the road, making up nine places from his grid position.

However, a five-second time penalty awarded for making contact with Kenta Yamashita exiting Turn 1 as they battled over ninth place on lap 32 of 41 meant that de Vries dropped down to 11th in the final results.

That matched his result from Saturday’s opening race, when he fell two tenths of a second shy of overhauling Kondo Racing’s Yamashita for the final point in 10th.

While satisfied with his performance, de Vries pointed out the difference between his version of events in his battle with Yamashita and those of the stewards, and feels the move would have been deemed legal in categories outside of Japan.

“I would call the [penalty] decision very domestic-specific, made by people who are watching 100 metres away from the corner, which is different from my view,” said de Vries.

“If you watch the footage, it’s clear that at the apex I am almost half a car length in front of [Yamashita]. I am on the normal line, so I am accelerating at the optimum point, so I have no chance to back out because I need to use all the track.

Nyck de Vries, ITOCHU ENEX TEAM IMPUL

Photo by: Masahide Kamio

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“He accelerates to try and recover the missed ground, but he is going for a gap that isn’t there. I am at maximum lock, and he is coming from the outside and hits me.

“I just feel bad for the team because they’ve had a tough season and they deserve it.”

De Vries added that hopes Super Formula will adopt a more international approach to the rules that govern wheel-to-wheel combat in future.

“People have asked me what I think about Super Formula and how it can become even more relevant to Formula 2 and Formula 1, and I praise the series, because the cars are great and the racing is great,” he said.

“But this kind of rule that has nothing to do with international racing doesn’t make sense to me.”

De Vries’ recovery into the points was all the more remarkable as he was caught up in a second-lap incident involving Iori Kimura and Atsushi Miyake at Turn 10.

That forced the Dutch driver into the pits to replace his front wing, although the resulting safety car meant he was able to restart at the tail of the field.

Nyck de Vries, ITOCHU ENEX TEAM IMPUL

Photo by: Masahide Kamio

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A further safety car period was called when Yuji Kunimoto tapped Kazuya Oshima into a spin at Turn 1 then allowed de Vries to pit under caution and make up further places.

“Our pace was very good in that first stint,” reflected de Vries. “[After the contact] we were overtaking a car almost every lap, so we were making ground anyway, and then the second safety car played into our hands. 

“Actually on the first lap, I was already ahead of [Ayumu] Iwasa. Most of the ground I lost with the front wing change, I already made up before the second pitstop, because I came out behind Kamui [Kobayashi] and Iwasa was just ahead of him.”

Toyota junior Hibiki Taira will take over the #19 Impul car, which was driven earlier in the year by Formula 2 champion Theo Pourchaire and Lexus IMSA regular Ben Barnicoat, for next month’s season finale at Suzuka.

Taira took the car’s only points finish of the year so far on Super Formula’s previous visit to Fuji in July, when he finished ninth.

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Sho Tsuboi made it a double Super Formula victory at Fuji on Sunday to grab the championship lead heading into the final weekend of the season next month at Suzuka.

TOM’S man Tsuboi converted his first pole of the year into another win at Fuji, giving himself a perfect record at the Toyota-owned venue in 2024 and becoming the first driver to win two races in a single weekend since Andre Lotterer in 2011.

Nirei Fukuzumi proved Tsuboi’s nearest challenger in an incident-strewn race that featured no fewer than three safety car periods, finishing second for KCMG, while Tadasuke Makino cemented second in the standings in third place.

The first caution period came on just the second lap of 41 as Iori Kimura tipped Atsushi Miyake into a spin at the Turn 10 right-hander, with Nyck de Vries also getting caught up in the melee and having to pit for a fresh front wing.

Tsuboi maintained the lead through to the second safety car period, triggered when Kazuya Oshima was sent into a spin by Yuji Kunimoto at Turn 1.

That came not long after the pit window opened and several frontrunners, including Fukuzumi, had come into the pits for their mandatory stops.

But with Tsuboi able to complete his in-lap at virtually unabated pace, he maintained the lead ahead of Fukuzumi, while Ren Sato beat Makino out of the pits to move into third.

After the restart on lap 17, Tsuboi began to eke away from Fukuzumi, but the KCMG driver kept the leader in his sights and was only a matter of tenths behind when the safety car made its final appearance on lap 32.

That followed a collision between Sena Sakaguchi and Naoki Yamamoto exiting Turn 2, which saw the front of Yamamoto’s Nakajima Racing car get airborne as he rode up on the back of Sakaguchi’s Inging machine.

Yamamoto was seen being stretchered into an ambulance and was taken to the medical centre for checks.

Tomoki Nojiri, TEAM MUGEN

Photo by: Masahide Kamio

The race resumed with just three laps left with Tsuboi heading home Fukuzumi by 1.3 seconds, while Makino was able to wrest third back off Ren Sato prior to the final safety car period.

That means he heads to next month’s Suzuka finale trailing Tsuboi by 14.5 points, with 46 on offer across the double-header weekend.

Sato still claimed his best finish of the year for Nakajima Racing in fourth, ahead of Kakunoshin Ota, who recovered well from 14th on the grid in the second Dandelion car.

Kamui Kobayashi was sixth in the second KCMG car after a late pass on Red Bull junior Ayumu Iwasa, the Mugen driver having started down in 12th after his best lap in qualifying was taken away for a track limits breach.

After his early dramas, de Vries recovered to finish eighth in his final outing for Team Impul, passing a fading Tomoki Nojiri (Mugen) just prior to the final caution period, while Kenta Yamashita claimed the final point for Kondo Racing in 10th

Nojiri finds himself 18.5 points down on Tsuboi after losing six places from his grid position.

Post-race Sato was handed a 10-second penalty for making contact at Turn 1 with Makino as he exited the pits, dropping him out of the points to 15th place.

It means Ota moves up to fourth ahead of Kobayashi and Iwasa.

De Vries was also stripped of his points finish for contact with Yamashita, with a five-second penalty dropping the Dutchman down to 11th.

As a result, Nojiri jumps two places to seventh ahead of Yamashita, while Iori Kimura and Toshiki Oyu are promoted into the final points positions.

Two extra points for Nojiri means he goes to the Suzuka finale 16.5 points behind Tsuboi.

Super Formula Fuji – Race 2 results (before penalties):

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