Campos Racing’s Noel León secured his second podium in three races with a P3 finish in the F2 Feature Race at the 2026 Italian GP, marking his fifth podium of the season.
The Mexican driver remained close to the Invicta Racing duo of Joshua Dürksen and Rafael Câmara for much of the race before eventually dropping away from the pair by Lap 28. Nonetheless, the Feature Race podium rounded out a strong weekend for León, who qualified fourth on the road before he and several other drivers received grid penalties for both races.
Speaking in the post-Feature press conference, attended by Pit Debrief, the 21 year-old reflected on his race, saying: “Yes, quite a good race to be honest. We managed to do everything well, and we recovered some positions. It was unfortunate to take that penalty from qualifying, so that dropped us to P7, and then finishing the podium is the best way.”
“These guys [Invicta Racing], they were just a bit too quick for me today. I tried to keep it until the end but the last laps they were quite fast. So yeah, very happy with the team, with the work it’s been doing and in general the whole weekend.”
León remains satisfied with Monza results
With tyre degradation remaining relatively low, León noted that drivers were able to push at near qualifying-pace during the final stint. Although an opportunity to challenge the Invicta duo for victory never came, the Mexican walked away pleased with the pace he showed and the result he achieved at Monza.
“Yes, I think so. At the end, deg was not too big so we were doing quali laps.”, León said. “And yeah, I couldn’t do the last three laps as a quali, so they started to create a gap. And yeah, if they were battling, I think I would get a chance, but they never did. So yeah, just happy with our result and with the weekend.”
Preparation will be “key” to brand new MADRING venue
Up next, the Formula 2 grid heads to a new venue in Madrid this week. The street circuit will present drivers with a fresh challenge, combining tight corners with banked sections.
When asked by Pit Debrief how important preparation and resetting would be ahead of such a contrasting track in such a short turnaround, León echoed similar sentiments to Dürksen and Câmara, saying: “Yeah, like these guys said, preparation is going to be key. We need to prepare as much as we can.”
“Obviously we saw in F3 how it went. We have some onboards to look at and some comments as teammates and drivers. So yeah, preparation is going to be key. It looks quite fun the track to drive. It’s a kind of Macau or Jeddah circuit, so yeah, I really love it and we’ll see how it goes.”
Heading into the eleventh round of the season, the Mexican sits fifth in the Drivers’ Standings with 114 points, having closed the gap to Rodin Motorsport’s Alex Dunne ahead of him.
