After a busy few days of pre-season testing, Rodin Motorsport’s Christian Mansell discussed his expectations for 2025 FIA Formula 2 season. This will be the Australian’s first full season in F2. He previously completed three rounds of the 2024 championship, finishing 25th in the standings with an impressive 10 points.
Mansell “comfortable” after pre-season testing with Rodin Motorsport
While speaking with media, including Pit Debrief, during a press event, Mansell spoke about his transition to Rodin Motorsport after competing with Trident in 2024. Mansell stated that despite systematic similarities, there had been noticeable differences. He added testing the car on track had helped his adjustment.
“I think, you know, you don’t really expect that being the same car, but I think it was sort of a similar jump from Campos to ART in F3.”
“Everything, you know, is systematically the same, but the actual driving, the actual set-up of the car and everything else, it’s pretty different so the race has helped me a lot.”
He stated that the pre-season testing had been “fantastic” and that he had “gelled really well” within his team, including his teammate Alexander Dunne, who joins the Rodin Motorsport F2 line-up after a mixed 2024 F3 season with MP Motorsport.
“Yeah, no, I mean, the test has gone fantastic. I mean, the team and I have gelled really well. I think obviously we went through all of the processes that we needed to go through. Alex and I were really comfortable. “
Mansell penalised after breach of sporting regulations
When asked about the deletion of his laptimes from the second day of testing, however, Mansell could not provide an answer. He stated that he did not have the technical expertise required to fully understand the reason.
“But as far as the times being deleted, I genuinely don’t have any idea because I’m not an engineer. So as much as I’d love to let you know, I genuinely don’t know.”
Officials deleted Mansell’s lap times after they found his car in breach of Article 10.2 of the FIA Formula 2 Sporting Regulations. They issued the same penalty to his teammate Dunne, DAMS Lucas Oil’s Jak Crawford, and Trident’s Max Esterson, and will refer the matter to the Stewards at the season opener in Melbourne.
Mansell aiming to deliver “the absolute maximum of the car” in 2025
Mansell, however, does not seem fazed by the matter. Instead, he remains focused on starting 2025 strong. When asked about his goals for the upcoming season, the Rodin Motorsport driver stated that he planned to approach it the same way he had his 2024 F3 campaign.
“I’m going to approach it the same way I approached last year with ART in the fact of just deliver the absolute maximum of the car.”
However, he admitted that setting specific goals was difficult since the team would not know how they compared competitively until the opening races.
“So, I think we won’t know what a bad year looks like or a good year looks like until after sort of Bahrain and Jeddah to sort of see where the car’s at, where I’m at and then we can make a good call on that.”
Rodin Motorsport in “a good place” despite drivers’ inexperience
While Mansell acknowledged that the 2025 F2 Rodin Motorsport line-up was fairly inexperienced, with both him and Dunne only just stepping up to F2, the team was in a good place.
“I mean, look, it’s no surprise that we’re a very inexperienced driver lineup as far as things go, but honestly, from what we see and what we’re sort of looking at and how we’ve performed internally, because obviously, you know, testing is testing. It’s not really what it seems sometimes, but we believe that we’re in a good place. “
He explained that he and Dunne were capable of maximising their performance in the car, and had managed to get through “the basics” very quickly.
“We believe that we can maximise the package as much as a second-year driver or a third-year driver. So we’re honestly not too worried about the lack of experience because we’ve sort of managed to get all of the basics, all of the philosophy stuff done very, very quickly.”
Mansell concluded, “And yeah, we truly believe that we’re in a good place and it won’t matter.”
Return to Rodin Motorsport “a full circle moment”
He explained that returning to Rodin Motorsport, the team he raced with in the 2020 F4 British Championship and the 2021 GB3 Championship, felt like a “full circle moment” since many of the people working with him in F2 had been part of the F4 then-Carlin team in 2020. Mansell added that his familiarity with the team had helped him gel with them.
“I think as far as gelling with the team, it’s not really been an issue at all because I used to race for the team back in 2020 in British F4 and honestly all of the people that were there when I was there are sort of in the F2 team now. So it’s been quite a full circle moment actually.”
Mansell to continue advocacy despite limitation
During the press event, Mansell also spoke about his advocacy on social media. In recent months, the Australian driver has become increasingly outspoken on social media, actively condemning sexism and discrimination against the LGBTQI+ community. Mansell has also worked to raise awareness about type 1 diabetes—a chronic autoimmune disease that limits insulin production.
However, Mansell’s public advocacy could put him at odds with the FIA. Article 12.2.1.o of the updated 2025 International Sporting Code prohibits drivers from “the general making and display of political, religious, and personal statements or comments notable in violation of the general principle of neutrality promoted by the FIA under its Statutes.” If Mansell breaches this regulation, he could face severe penalties,
While the 20-year-old acknowledges that the regulations will limit the ways in which he can express his thoughts on sensitive topics, he insists that he will continue to speak out, explaining that “it felt right” to be able to use his platform positively.
“I think personally it’s a fantastic thing to do, obviously using your platform for something that is positive rather than just letting it sort of sit.”
“I think it’s something that obviously I’ve been passionate about and I’ve not seen many people do, so, you know, I’ve always been about a point of interest, a point of difference. Obviously, with me being diabetic and a lot of other things, it felt right to sort of, you know, keep on being that point of difference to people.”
“So I sort of leaned into it more and people really responded quite well. And yeah, so I’m going to continue to do that. I’m obviously limited with the new sort of rules with the FIA on how much we can speak about stuff, but still obviously very passionate about that.”
