Rachel Robertson has endured a challenging but increasingly promising start to her first full F1 Academy campaign in 2026. After seven of the season’s 14 races, the PUMA-supported Hitech driver sits 14th in the Drivers’ Standings with 13 points.
Incidents, penalties and difficult starting positions prevented Robertson from scoring during the opening rounds in Shanghai and Montreal. However, she transformed her season at Silverstone by qualifying fifth and finishing fourth and sixth, scoring all 13 of her points during her home round.
Early promise ends in disappointment in Shanghai
Robertson entered the 2026 season with limited single-seater experience after making her F1 Academy debut as a substitute at the 2025 Las Vegas finale. She impressed immediately by climbing from 14th to 4th in the opening race, securing Hitech’s best result of the season.
Her full-time debut in Shanghai also produced encouraging signs. Robertson briefly moved to the top of the practice timesheets and showed that she could compete within the tightly matched midfield. However, qualifying 12th left her outside the reversed section of the grid and made scoring points more difficult.
She finished 10th in the Reverse Grid Race before retiring from the Feature Race following contact with Hitech Wild Card driver Shi Wei. Robertson had run off track and collected dust on her tyres before misjudging her braking into Turn 14. The stewards handed her a five-place grid penalty for the next race. Shanghai therefore ended without points despite Robertson showing more competitive pace than her results suggested.
Penalties and contact disrupt Montreal weekend
Robertson faced another unfamiliar circuit in Montreal, where qualifying determined the starting order for two of the weekend’s three races. Contact with the wall during the session disrupted her preparation and left her starting near the rear.
She recovered to 11th on the road in the Opening Race but received a five-second penalty for contact with Natalia Granada, dropping her to 13th. Robertson had become boxed in while attempting to avoid Autumn Fisher but struck Granada and sent her into a spin. Her Reverse Grid Race ended on the second lap when Ella Lloyd hit the rear of her car at the final chicane. The stewards held Lloyd responsible, but the collision forced Robertson into her second retirement in four races.
Robertson completed the wet Feature Race in 14th after battling Esmee Kosterman and Jade Jacquet. Both drivers received penalties for incidents involving Robertson, although she remained outside the points. Montreal became another frustrating weekend in which Robertson showed flashes of recovery pace but could not complete a clean, points-scoring race. Some incidents came through no fault of her own, but her qualifying mistake and Opening Race penalty also highlighted the consistency she still needed to develop.
Silverstone breakthrough transforms Robertson’s 2026 F1 Academy season
Robertson finally converted her potential into results at Silverstone. Previous testing experience at the circuit helped her secure fifth in qualifying, her best starting position in F1 Academy. She started the Reverse Grid Race from fourth and remained close to the podium battle throughout the contest. Despite pressure from championship leader Alisha Palmowski, Robertson defended successfully and finished fourth to claim her first five points of the season.
Robertson then started fifth in the Feature Race. She lost positions to Lloyd and Emma Felbermayr during the opening lap but avoided further trouble and brought the car home in sixth. Her fourth and sixth-place finishes earned her 13 points and made Silverstone the strongest weekend of her F1 Academy career. She also entered the summer break as Hitech’s highest-placed full-time driver.
Robertson’s performance contributed to Hitech’s best round of the season. Wild Card driver Chiara Bättig secured the team’s first F1 Academy podium, while Robertson and Ava Dobson scored in both races. Hitech collected 41 points across the weekend and moved above ART Grand Prix in the Teams’ Standings.
Qualifying remains key to second-half progress
The opening half of Robertson’s season has underlined the importance of qualifying. Starting 12th in Shanghai and near the back in Montreal exposed her to congested midfield battles and left little time to recover. Qualifying fifth at Silverstone allowed her to avoid much of that risk and fight for points from the beginning.
Her Silverstone results proved that she possesses the pace to compete inside the top 10. However, she must reproduce that performance more consistently and reduce the errors that affected her opening two rounds. Zandvoort, Austin and Las Vegas remain on the calendar, leaving Robertson with seven races to build on her breakthrough. She has already shown encouraging pace during testing at Zandvoort, while her fourth-place result in Las Vegas last season should provide confidence ahead of the finale.
Robertson’s rookie campaign has so far combined clear potential with costly inconsistency. Shanghai and Montreal produced penalties, incidents and missed opportunities, but Silverstone demonstrated what she can achieve when she qualifies near the front and completes clean races.
The second half of the season will reveal whether her home-round success was an isolated highlight or the beginning of sustained momentum.
