During the final weekend of the season in Abu Dhabi, it was announced that Lia Block will continue F1 Academy. She’ll enter her second year in the all-female series still representing Williams Racing. The Formula 1 team seems to be pleased with the American driver, renewing their partnership with her and keeping her in the Williams Racing Driver Academy.
Block will also remain part of ART Grand Prix team, who’ll operate her car in 2025. Her current teammates are McLaren’s Bianca Bustamante and Aurelia Nobles, sponsored by Puma. While Bustamante will leave F1 Academy after her maximum of two years in the series, Nobles’ future remains unclear.
First year in single-seaters
The 2024 F1 Academy season marked a major step in Block’s career. She made the transition from rallying and karting into single-seaters.
Previously, she enjoyed success in series such as ARA Championship, Extreme E, Nitrocross NEXT and others. This year, she had a pretty decent rookie season in F1 Academy – just one place short of a podium finish multiple times and currently sitting in eight in the Drivers’ Championship.
“This time we fight for wins!” promises Lia Block
“I’m excited to be racing with Williams Racing and ART Grand Prix for the 2025 season, and I’m looking forward to working with everyone in the Driver Academy for another year,” Lia Block shared her excitement from the announcement.
“We’ve made so much progress, and I can’t wait to hit the track again in Shanghai. This time we fight for wins!”
It’s clear that when the first round of F1 Academy 2025 comes, Block will be determined to show what she’s got. It will be her second and therefore last year in the all-female series – and she’ll be well aware of that fact.
Sven Smeets on Block’s “impressive improvement”
The Sporting Director at Williams Racing, Sven Smeets, also commented on the re-signing of Lia Block:
“We’re thrilled to have Lia racing with us in F1 Academy for 2025. Lia has shown impressive improvement throughout her first season of open-wheel racing, progressing race after race to end the year in a great position.”
“We’ll be closely watching her continued growth in the coming year.”
Lia Block will continue F1 Academy… what about the others?
Even though the winter break is knocking on the door, the future of most current drivers isn’t certain. The announcement that Lia Block will continue F1 Academy with Williams is one of the first ones.
So far, we know that there are eight women leaving the series because of the maximum limit of two years. Those are: Nerea Martí, Jessica Edgar, Bianca Bustamante, Lola Lovinfosse, Hamda and Anna Al Qubaisi, Carrie Schreiner and Emely de Heus. Along with them, the championship winner is also obligated to leave the series, which will most likely be Abbi Pulling. So that’s nine.
From this year’s Wild Card entries, three were announced for a full-time seat in 2025. Nina Gademan representing Alpine, Courtney Crone signing with Haas and Ella Lloyd driving for McLaren.
Then, RB signed Rafaela Ferreira and Tommy Hilfiger will sponsor Alba Hurup Larsen next year. It’s also known for a while that Chloe Chambers will represent Red Bull Ford.
Six seats taken, twelve remaining with the news of Hitech Grand Prix joining the grid and expanding it to eighteen cars in total.
