Having completed 2 years in F1 Academy she has left circuit racing and returned to rallying.
She was leading her first rally back by 3 minutes until a mechanical fault on the car dropped her to 3rd.
So far, she has backed this up with another 3rd place in her 2nd rally.
A pretty strong return so far, It will be fun to see If she can reach an international level.
And maybe race Pikes Peak for real.
Abbi Pulling is one of the leading female prospects to watch out for in 2026.
In 2024 she dominated F1 Academy and gained herself a full series of the formula regional championship GB3 for 2025 paid for by F1 Academy.
In 2025 she showed consistency and gradual improvement across the year finishing 10th with a late podium.
As F1 Academy only pay for 1 season I expected her career to then be over but she has somehow found funding for another GB3 year in 2026 - this time with a year of experience of the car/tyres under her belt and set up knowledge for each track.
The opening round has happened and reports are of genuine front running pace mixed with poor luck.
She qualified 4th for the first race and 5th for the second race.
She was forced to retire from race 1 with a suspension failure.
She was in a genuine 3rd place in race 2 with 1 minute to go when another driver crashed into her and forced another DNF.
In race 3, the reverse grid, she finished 10th, promoted later to 8th.
While the final results did not reflect her full potential, Pulling left Silverstone with clear evidence of front-running pace. Across all three races, she had demonstrated the speed to fight consistently at the front, with misfortune denying her a likely podium finish.
Daughter of Mikka Hakkinen and McLaren Junior driver, Ella Hakkinen is racing F4 Central European Zone (F4 CEZ).
The opening round is complete and she has recorded 8th, 11th and 12th place finishes putting her 14th out of 41 after round 1.
Highlights with commentary from Lia on coming back from 13th to 3rd.
If you haven't watched IndyCar qualifying yet, I won't spoil specific results, but I thought she was incredibly impressive, considering she drew the very last spot in qualifying. For those who don't know, all 33 cars do a warm up lap and 4 flying laps (taking the average speed), and the order they go in is randomly drawn. All the drivers towards the end of the draw suffered greatly in the heat, and she got the worst of it. I wonder where she could have gotten if she'd been towards the front of the draw instead of the very last.
Next weekend, she is attempting the double, attempting to drive all 500 miles of the Indy 500 and then get helicoptered to Charlotte to drive all 600 miles of the Coca Cola 600. She's never even raced in Charlotte before.
I've not been deeply familiar with Katherine Legge's career. I just started watching IndyCar last year. But my understanding is that her career has been marked with being underfunded and rarely in a top car. When I watch her in Indy 500 qualifying, I don't see a diversity pick, I see an extremely talented driver who has deserved more opportunities in her career. I really really hope she can complete the double. It would be an incredible feat. Unfortunate that there's a fair amount of luck needed, I just hope it can work out.
The first round of Kyojo Cup happened pretty recently, and I thought some people here might be interested. I’ll put spoilers in the comments but not in the post.
Here’s the season guide that Feederseries made before the season started:
https://feederseries.net/2026/05/07/kyojo-cup-2026-season-guide/
Familiar names for non-Japanese speakers might be Joanne Ciconte, 17, who was in F1 Academy last year, and 15 year old Sara Matsui, who was a Williams junior while in karting, and this is her first step into single seaters.
Like F1 Academy, Kyojo Cup it is an all women’s series in F4 level machinery (it was in different machinery until last year.) Unlike F1 Academy, it’s not exclusively for younger women/girls, there are some older women in the series. There is also nothing that bars the champion from returning, because it is not considered a junior series.
Quali sets the grid for the sprint race, the sprint race sets the grid for the feature.
I heard there was a way to watch it in English (heard it here https://www.dive-bomb.com/article/why-you-should-watch-the-kyojo-cup-season-in-2026#:~:text=The%202026%20season%20starts%20on,accessible%20racing%20series%20from%20Japan.), but I couldn’t find it. If someone knows of an English broadcast, let me know. I put on English subtitles, but I definitely had trouble following.
Quali: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzCZcQBxsWk
Sprint: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EXsEZ8t5IY
Race: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4i4d99frS8&t=458s
If you want to read feederseries report of the weekend, it’s here, just scroll down to the last section: https://feederseries.net/2026/05/11/feeder-series-weekend-review-results-and-standings-07-10-may-2026/
When she and her team won 3 of the 6 LMP2 ELMS races last year it looked like the championship was on the cards but they somehow ended up finishing 3rd.
This year they have opened with 2 4th places.
Can they turn it around mid season and fight at the front again.
She has had such a good junior career so far, I want to see her get to Hypercar WEC.
She has been testing ahead of the Le Mans 24 hours in her role as reserve driver.