When Nicola Lacorte graduated into the 2025 F3 Championship with DAMS Lucas Oil and the backing of the Alpine Academy, the move represented the biggest test of his young career. The Italian teenager carried experience from Italian F4 and Formula Regional, along with a reputation for flashes of speed and determination. Yet, as many rookies discover, F3 demands not only pace but also precision, consistency, and discipline. Over the course of the season, Lacorte’s journey became defined by moments of promise overshadowed by errors and penalties. His debut year proved less a story of results and more a lesson in adaptation.
Glimpses of progress, signs of strain
The first three rounds in Melbourne, Sakhir, and Imola showed both strengths and weaknesses in Lacorte’s approach. In Melbourne, he qualified near the back but climbed to sixteenth in the Sprint before slipping to twenty-fourth in the Feature. It was an encouraging sign that he could gain ground in a race, but it also highlighted the difficulty he faced in matching the outright pace of the midfield.
In Bahrain, he looked slightly stronger, even out-qualifying a team-mate, but an incident forced him to retire from the Sprint and his twentieth place in the Feature left him once again outside of the points. Imola briefly offered a more encouraging picture: he qualified eighteenth, ran a clean Sprint to fifteenth, and looked to be settling in. Yet the weekend ended on a sour note, as a penalty for leaving the track and retaining a place dropped him from nineteenth to twenty-fifth in the Feature. These early rounds revealed a pattern that would persist throughout the year: promising moments undermined by small but costly errors.
Monaco and Barcelona – Difficult weekends in demanding conditions
The calendar’s toughest test came early with Monaco, and it was here that Lacorte’s season began to unravel. In qualifying, after receiving outside assistance, he mistakenly continued despite being shown the black flag. This error resulted in disqualification and penalty points on his licence. His Sprint ended in a collision, and a suspension issue forced retirement in the Feature. By the close of the weekend, he had no finishes and carried seven penalty points.
Barcelona compounded the difficulties. Frustration in qualifying led to a collision with José Garfias, which the stewards judged as avoidable. Grid penalties followed, and further problems arrived in the Feature when Lacorte breached the Safety Car delta on multiple occasions. Contact with Brando Badoer added to the tally, pushing his penalty points total to fourteen. Under FIA rules, that figure triggered an automatic race ban, making Lacorte the first driver of the season to face suspension.
The Spielberg suspension forces a pause
The ban at Spielberg was a major setback. It meant not only a missed round but also a break in rhythm at a point in the season when experience was crucial. For any rookie, seat time is invaluable, and losing a full weekend of racing inevitably slowed his adaptation to the category. The ban became the defining marker of his first half of the season, placing greater pressure on him to reset and recover when he returned.
Signs of improvement, but no breakthrough in the final four rounds
On his return at Silverstone, Lacorte produced his most complete performance of the season. From twenty-seventh on the grid, he drove cleanly and carefully to finish fifteenth in the Feature, showing what was possible when he combined composure with steady pace. At Spa, he went one better in qualifying, securing fifteenth on the grid and finishing sixteenth in the Sprint. Unfortunately, the Feature was cancelled due to poor weather, denying him the chance to convert a promising start into a stronger result.
The remaining rounds in Budapest and Monza offered fewer positives. A Sprint retirement and eighteenth in the Feature at the Hungaroring reflected the persistence of inconsistency, while his home weekend ended with twenty-eighth and twenty-second. Although he managed to avoid the major disciplinary setbacks of the first half of the season, the hoped-for points never materialised.
Lessons in discipline and consistency
Viewed as a whole, Lacorte’s 2025 season was one of struggle. He ended thirty-first in the standings, without a single point, and with the unwanted distinction of a race suspension. Yet the statistics do not tell the entire story. In Silverstone and Spa he showed that he could compete respectably in the midfield when everything came together. At Imola, his Sprint performance underlined that he was capable of running cleanly and sensibly in traffic. These glimpses of promise suggest that the raw ingredients are there.
At the same time, the campaign also made clear what he must improve. His qualifying pace left him too often near the back, forcing him into the most hazardous part of the pack. His disciplinary record—particularly at Monaco and Barcelona—overshadowed any progress and became the narrative of his year. Equally, his emotional control in high-pressure moments proved fragile, with frustration leading to poor decisions. These are the qualities that separate successful rookies from those who fall short.
A year of hard lessons
Nicola Lacorte’s debut season in F3 will be remembered as one of hard lessons rather than results. The first half was dominated by penalties and a suspension, while the second half steadied but never quite delivered the breakthrough he needed. At the end of the year he remained without points, but with valuable experience—experience that could yet serve him if he chooses to learn from it.
F3 is unforgiving, and Lacorte has discovered just how quickly a campaign can unravel when discipline and composure slip. The challenge now is to treat this year not as a failure but as a turning point. If he can refine his control, sharpen his consistency, and build on the few positive weekends he did have, there is still potential for him to rebuild his path. His rookie year may have been defined by penalties, but whether it defines his career will depend on how he responds.
