Euro 4 Monza recap – Feeder Series

The Temple of Speed hosted the last round of Euro 4 in 2024. The championship contenders took a step back and left the spotlight to an array of new stars as some of the best Formula 4 racing of recent years lit up the Autodromo Nazionale Monza in a nail-baiting season finale. 

By Francesca Brusa

Rookies to the rescue

The last Euro 4 weekend of the year saw some new names appear at the top of the order, including three first-time polesitters. While US Racing’s Maxim Rehm put together his best lap of the year to earn a first-place start for race one, it was PHM Racing driver Davide Larini who took pole position in qualifying two. Kean Nakamura-Berta set the best second-fastest lap in the second session to start first in race three.

But it wasn’t easy for the leaders to keep the rest of the grid behind them. Race one, for example, saw four drivers out of the race in two separate incidents before the first lap was even completed. On lap six, after the first safety car restart, Gowda pushed Rehm into the grass before Parabolica and did so once more the next time around in Curva Grande, which sent the German spinning into the gravel and forced him to retire.

Alex Powell avoided the carnage behind and ahead of him to secure the win after passing the US Racing duo of Jack Beeton and Akshay Bohra with three laps to go. The Mercedes junior brought home his first win in the Euro 4 Championship towards the end of a promising first year in single-seaters.

To balance out the chaos that characterised race one, race two saw zero safety car interventions. Polesitter Larini fell down the order to third position at the start and finished fifth. Despite being challenged by soon-to-be champion Akshay Bohra on several occasions, Kean Nakamura-Berta took the chequered flag first for his maiden Euro 4 win, adding to his three previous victories across F4 UAE and Italian F4.

The last event on Sunday brought redemption for Rehm, who stormed from 12th on the grid to the top step of the podium after nailing the two safety-car restarts. For the third time in a single weekend, it was a first-time winner who lifted the first-place trophy under the Italian sky. 

Bohra crowned 2024 Euro 4 champion

Bohra’s run for the crown can be described by the phrase “all’s well that ends well”. After dominating the first round of the series at Mugello, taking all pole positions and two of three race wins, the Indian-American driver fell back after taking consistent yet unsatisfying results in Austria.

The US Racing driver’s Monza weekend started off on a positive note, with performances in qualifying that earned him two front-row starts for the first two races. Despite battling at the front in race one and race two, Bohra had to settle for second-place finishes in each. 

The New York City–born racer entered the last event of the series with the championship lead and an advantage of eight points on his nearest competitor. A fifth-position finish in race three, as well as two non-scores results by title rivals Freddie Slater and Hiyu Yamakoshi, earned Bohra the title of 2024 Euro 4 champion. He follows in the footsteps of McLaren-backed Ugo Ugochukwu, who won the championship last year. 

Trouble for Slater and Yamakoshi

Aiding Bohra in his triumph were two out-of-character weekends by his two direct championship rivals. The favourite for the title, Slater, entered the last round of the series first in the standings and kicked off the running by going fastest in both free practice sessions.

A two-place grid drop for an unsafe rejoin in qualifying then saw the Englishman start from sixth in race one despite setting the fourth-fastest time in qualifying one. After making up some positions in the first half of the race, Slater spun his car in the second half and, despite recovering many places, had to settle for 10th position as the chequered flag waved. Post-race penalties elevated the Prema Racing driver to fifth, meaning he entered the final day of racing as the championship leader.

While luck had been favourable to the British driver in race one, it wasn’t the case in race two. After winning out in a fierce battle for fourth position with Larini, Slater earned a five-second post-race penalty for forcing another driver off the track that dropped him to ninth. The Prema Racing driver’s Sunday went from bad to worse when he had to retire his car in lap one of race three after collecting damage on the opening lap.  

Yamakoshi, on the other hand, started the weekend off on the wrong foot by qualifying 17th and 14th. Having to make up ground from outside the top 10 in all three races, the Japanese driver dragged his Van Amersfoort Racing car to sixth position at the chequered flag for race one but finished outside the points after being handed a five-second post-race penalty for forcing another driver off the track. 

What punished Slater helped Yamakoshi in race two. From 14th on the grid, the Japanese driver took the chequered flag in ninth position, just inside the points, but was later promoted to seventh place because of Slater’s and Larini’s penalties. But luck wasn’t on the Van Amersfoort Racing’s driver side when, in race three, contact with US Racing’s Beeton in the first lap sent him to the back of the field, from where he only recovered to 15th.

While Slater managed to bag a second-place finish in the series, Yamakoshi was displaced by Nakamura-Berta in the standings and had to settle for fourth position. 

Nakamura secures rookie title, Prema secure teams’

In the end, Prema Racing couldn’t bring home their third drivers’ championship in eight days at the Euro 4 finale. Nevertheless, the Grisignano di Zocco–based team still celebrated victory in both the rookie and the team standings.

Nakamura-Berta was the first-place finisher among the debutants. The Japanese driver impressed in the three-event series with three overall podiums and seven points-scoring results, which amounted to three rookie wins and five further rookie podiums. He beat Prema Racing teammate Tomass Štolcermanis, who took only one win in the rookie category and finished fifth overall.

Prema Racing claimed the teams’ title early, at the end of race two. It is the second year that the Italian outfit has achieved this result, though the gap this year over second-placed US Racing was 29 points rather than 150.

Editor’s note, 10 October 2024, 21:20 CEST: This article has been updated to clarify the cause of Maxim Rehm’s retirement from race one.

Header photo credit: ACI Sport