Why Freddie Slater is the next star on the road to F1

Some of the statistics surrounding Freddie Slater’s success to date are just staggering. The British rising star has already claimed five titles since bursting onto the car racing scene at the end of 2022 with the Ginetta Junior Winter Series crown, following a glittering karting career.

He has achieved a remarkable 54 wins from 155 car races – a supreme strike rate of being victorious in one in three contests he has started. And that’s all the more spectacular when you consider that he has been constantly climbing the racing pyramid and achieving glory as soon as he has progressed up another level on the ladder.

Slater’s latest title success came in the Formula Regional European Championship by Alpine last year. But, despite his trophy cabinets bursting at the hinges at the age of just 17, Slater insists he does not take such a haul of silverware for granted at the start of a new campaign.

Take FRECA as an example. He began the season off the back of a steamrollering performance in Italian F4 in 2024 and then finished runner-up in Formula Regional Middle East during the winter.

“After the F4 year, I went into Formula Regional with a neutral head,” Slater recalls. “I wasn’t expecting anything – I wasn’t expecting to win 15 races, I wasn’t expecting to win none. That was the way of keeping my feet on the ground, staying humble and seeing where the results take us.”

Those results took him to the championship, in the end – although he was not as dominant as in previous seasons. Slater finished 36 points clear of newly promoted McLaren junior Matteo De Palo in the final table – he won eight races to the Italian’s four – but he endured a few tricky events, including when he was slow away from pole in the Misano opener and was then tagged from behind, and being disqualified at Imola when valve caps were missing from his left wheels, before finishing very strongly.

Formula Regional success wasn’t guaranteed for Slater amid De Palo’s threat

Photo by: AG Photo – Daniele Paglino

“We had quite a few issues throughout the year, especially at the start,” Slater acknowledges. “Quite a few things went wrong especially in our control but also out of our control. I’ve had to bounce back from quite a few mistakes from myself, so to walk away with a championship and finishing it in style with two wins at Monza is very satisfying.”

While the year ultimately ended with another title to his name, Slater says learning how to respond to those more challenging events was an important lesson to take away. “When the cards are on the table, and the opportunity is there, you’ve just got to maximise what you’ve got,” he says of what he learned.

“The goal in my head every time I go out on track is to maximise whatever we have, each weekend, each session, each lap, each moment, and I think that’s what really paid off. At the end of the day, it made us win the championship.”

“His work attitude, his dedication, he’s really into all the details and he’s trying to push the boundaries to the extreme to get everything done perfectly” Rene Rosin

Slater says he “definitely dug very deep” to respond to some of those setbacks and worked closely with his Prema Racing squad to find solutions. “We looked internally with the team, with myself, we looked at every little bit we could find, every percent,” he adds. “But everything paid off and it all came together in the end.”

Recently departed Prema boss Rene Rosin was certainly impressed with how his young charge conducted the campaign. Slater first joined the operation upon his move to single-seaters after he turned 15 in August 2023 and Rosin has witnessed him improve ever since.

“His work attitude, his dedication, he’s really into all the details and he’s trying to really push all the boundaries to the extreme to get everything done perfectly,” he says of Slater. “He pushes the team forward – he’s just a hard worker. He has the raw speed, innate talent but on the other hand there’s his determination – he knows what he wants – these are the key aspects for him.”

The British star scored a podium during his debut FIA F3 weekend

Photo by: Clive Rose / Getty Images

Rosin is in the fortunate position of having worked with many greats of the sport as they have passed through the Prema superteam on their way up the ranks, including Charles Leclerc and Oscar Piastri. But ask him how Slater compares, and his response is very coy.

“This is a question everybody asks!” he laughs. “All the drivers are their own. I look at all the drivers singularly, each of them, and never try to compare.” Rosin may be keeping his cards very close to his chest, but does describe Slater as a “great talent”.

And Slater’s ability has not only been seen in the red and white colours of Prema during 2025. Alongside his main Formula Regional focus, Slater also made a couple of cameo FIA F3 appearances – including finishing second on debut in Bahrain with AIX – while he scored three wins during three GB3 events for Hillspeed.

“As you know, my management [the ADD stable that also guided Lando Norris to F1 success] love to put me in different cars to try to give me some different experience and also to try to make me adaptable,” smiles Slater.

“They want me to be thrown in cars and be able to get on with it straight away and that’s the super-positive thing about working with them. I’ve always loved working with them and that’s the key to trying to be an even better driver.

“Not just a winning driver but trying to be as adaptable as I can because all the different techniques I learned in GB3, F3 and Formula Regional, they all come together and I can use them in certain moments, so it really helps.”

Macau ended in more disappointment, but Slater is determined to return

Photo by: Qian Jun / MB Media / Getty Images

Not every aspiring driver is fortunate enough to be in the position where they can tackle multiple series, and therefore Slater is keen to use this to his advantage and gain as much as he can from these opportunities.

“I don’t want to just be a race-winning driver, I want to be the complete driver and be a championship-winning driver for teams,” he states. “That’s the goal and that’s where my head is at. That’s why we do the prep now with all the different experiences and hopefully it pays off.”

Another of those different, extracurricular experiences came in the Macau Grand Prix in November. Slater has regularly starred on the unforgiving streets – he was on course for a podium in F4 in 2023 until car woes intervened, and then crashed out when challenging for the rostrum the following year in the GP.

Slater has long spoken of how much he enjoys the Macau event, and has also discussed his desire to race sportscars one day

There was another strong showing a couple of months ago, when Slater blitzed the opposition to dominate the qualifying race. But a mid-race safety car in the main contest, when he was again leading comfortably, turned proceedings on their head and he fell behind Mari Boya upon the resumption before crashing out amid his attempts to regain the initiative.

Despite the disappointment, Slater is determined that the sight of his stricken Prema machine in the barriers exiting R Bend does not represent the end of his Macau story. “If there’s an opportunity to be back, I will be back – that’s for sure,” he says definitively. “Even if it’s in another category like a GT3, then that’s in a GT3. If it’s in the FRECA, then it’s in the FRECA. I want to be back, I love the place.”

That may sound like an off-the-cuff, throwaway remark, but it gives an interesting insight into his character. Slater has long spoken of how much he enjoys the Macau event, and has also discussed his desire to race sportscars one day – after all, his father Adrian was a prolific Porsche competitor.

Ginetta Junior record book was rewritten back in the 2023 season

Photo by: LAT Images via Getty Images

But before thinking about any future Macau appearances, there are more pressing matters for Slater. He has already begun a Formula Regional Oceania campaign in New Zealand with M2 Competition, and the main focus is an FIA F3 bid with series dominator Trident (“I will try to get him back as soon as possible!” Rosin jokes.)

Slater says his 2025 outings were useful preparation but cautions that “the teams are making a lot of evolution from year one going into year two [of the Dallara F3 2025 car] so I think it will be very tight”.

Regardless, Slater wants to be a part of that tight battle at the front and continue his successful streak. “The goal is to win every year,” he states. “It’s always possible no matter what, even if we’re on the back foot. The goal is to try to win, and we will do everything we can to make that happen.”

While F3 wins are the focus for him, another Slater is also entering the world of single-seaters this year. His younger brother Alfie is joining the British Formula 4 field with Rodin Motorsport, so there could be even more silverware heading to the family.

One accolade that will not be joining Freddie’s extensive CV, however, is the Silverstone Autosport BRDC Award. After being a finalist in 2024 – when Slater was narrowly beaten to the prize by British F4 star Deagen Fairclough, two years his senior – the contest took a pause last year.

But should he be able to significantly add to his extensive tally of wins in F3, especially with the presence of reversed grids, that would be the clearest sign yet of the true talent behind those remarkable numbers.

This article is one of many in the monthly Autosport magazine. For more premium content, take a look at the February 2026 issue and subscribe today.

Slater enjoyed a dominant Italian F4 campaign in 2024 when he won 15 races

Photo by: Alex Galli