Gabriel Bortoleto will be joining the 2025 grid alongside his new teammate, Nico Hulkenburg in Sauber.
He is the third confirmed rookie on the grid as he joins the line-up that currently consists of Jack Doohan and Kimi Antonelli. They have secured their 2025 seats with Sauber, Alpine and Mercedes respectively.
Championship leader Bortoleto joined the current F2 grid as a rookie driver for Invicta Racing, as a member of the Mclaren Driver Development Programme.
The young Brazilian is also supported by two-time Formula One champion, Fernando Alonso. Having joined the Spaniard’s management agency, A14 Management back in September 2022.
Alonso has been mentoring several young talents including Bortoleto by providing technical advice and connections in the paddock.
Although it’s been disclosed that the Aston Martin driver had no hand in the contract offered to the 19-year old, it’s clear that champion’s support helped.
But Alonso isn’t the only driver who had a significant effect on Bortoleto’s driving.
When asked which driver he looked up to apart from Alonso, the Brazilian youngster named reigning F1 three-time World Champion, Max Verstappen.
“I really like how Max drives in the sense of like, I really admire his quali laps and how much he extracts from the car, you know, in these laps, the way he drives and races. I think it’s very nice.
“Obviously, it can be very hard. We have seen in the last few races, but obviously they are fighting for a World Championship.
“So we all expect them to race each other like that.”
The earlier successes for Verstappen in his junior series career made him a role model Bortoleto looked up to during his own karting days, especially having driven for the same karting team that the three-time F1 World Champion competed with — CRG SpA.
“But I think I’ve always admired how Max drives since I was very young, because I was part of a team in go-karts that he grew up with. So they always told me stories about him.
“And I was always like, ‘OK, what would Max do in this situation’? And I always wanted to, you know, to be a bit like him because he won every single thing he did in the Junior Series.”
However, his biggest racing hero to no surprise is Ayrton Senna. The three-time World Champion is a huge inspiration to many of the current Formula One drivers.
This includes Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc and Pierre Gasly. Senna’s legacy has him crowned as a national hero in his home country Brazil.
“For the driver he was, for everything he did on track, but also outside of the track, I think he was a great person with great morals.
“And the legacy he left behind and everything he did for Brazil. I think that’s something I am inspired by.”
