Ahead of his FIA Formula 2 debut with the team, Zane Maloney has confirmed that this weekend will mark his last race for Trident.
Maloney was this year’s runner-up in Formula 3 for the Italian team, but will be racing a different outfit in Formula 2 next season.
The Barbadian told F2 media: “I can confirm that this is the last race for now with Trident. I’ve had a great time with Giacomo [Ricci] and I’ll still be in Italy a lot next year having a good time with them, but this will be the last one for a while.”
The 19-year-old has proved his talent in Formula 3, winning all of the last three Feature Races of the season, and missing out on the title by just five points.
Heading into the weekend, Maloney said he is not putting pressure on himself to continue that winning streak in the new series: “I don’t have any expectations, two weeks ago I’d never even sat in an F2 car. I am just looking to have a clean weekend, and to get two races under my belt to see how the car is, and how the degradation is compared to F3.”
After starting relatively late in karting in 2016, Maloney won the British F4 Championship in 2019, and was 4th in the Formula Regional European Championship in 2021.
105 of his 134 points in F3 this season came in the final four rounds, as the rookie made a late charge for the title.
Looking back on F3, he said: “I’ve learnt so much from this season so far in terms of how to manage a weekend, Qualifying pace, race pace, and making fewer mistakes. My confidence is high but I’m stepping up to a different car with a different group of people – still with Trident but with different engineers and mechanics.”
Maloney replaces Calan Williams, who is without a drive after only scoring once all season, finishing fourth in Jeddah’s Sprint Race. He’ll line up alongside Richard Verschoor, who was the last driver to secure a seat this season, and won the opening Sprint Race of the season just weeks later.
2021’s F3 runner-up Jack Doohan also made the step up to F2 at the end of last season. The Aussie qualified on the front row in Abu Dhabi, and then took the first pole position this year in Bahrain.
Zane will not be worried about matching that performance on his debut this weekend, but will hope to use the experience he gains to prepare over the winter and make a similarly strong start to 2023.
