Red Bull junior star Arvid Lindblad — Photo: © IMAGO

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Red Bull star EXTENDS championship lead after stunning race victory

2025 has gotten off to an excellent start for the young star

Kerry Violet F1 News Editor

F1 editor and journalist covering motorsport since 2024.

Sunday 19 January 2025 17:09 Updated: 19:48

A Red Bull driver has extended his championship lead after a stunning race victory this weekend.

The 2025 Formula 1 campaign is still months away, with testing for the new season not set to get underway until late February in Bahrain.

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However, other series around the world are well underway, including the 2025 Castrol Toyota FR Oceania championship in which Red Bull junior star Arvid Lindblad is currently competing.

Lindblad is set to make the step up to the F2 later this year, but before he gets stuck into the demanding season of the Formula 1 feeder series, he has been demonstrating his racing prowess by taking the lead of another championship in New Zealand.

The Red Bull junior driver has been part of the F1 team's driver development programme since 2021 and has his eyes firmly set on a seat at the pinnacle of motorsport with the Red Bull family.

Red Bull have switched up both their F1 driver lineups for 2025

Liam Lawson was previously Red Bull's reserve driver and will now race for the main team this season

Both Red Bull and their junior team VCARB's driver lineup has undergone a makeover for 2025, after Christian Horner and Helmut Marko opted to sack an underperforming Sergio Perez, leaving multiple promotions up for grabs within the team.

In Perez's absence, Liam Lawson has stepped up from VCARB and Lindblad's fellow junior driver Isack Hadjar got the call to be promoted into Lawson's seat, racing alongside Yuki Tsunoda in his rookie season.

The team is still yet to confirm their reserve driver signings, however, and if Lindblad can continue his run of good form in the Formula Regional Oceania championship with the M2 Competition team, he could potentially secure enough points to grant him the superlicence he needs to become an F1 reserve.

Lindblad takes vital steps towards F1 entry

In that sense, the 17-year-old racer has now taken one step closer to appearing in F1, with his continued success in the Formula Regional Oceania Championship, extending his lead at the top of the standings.

Lindblad has previously been backed by Red Bull advisor Marko as one to watch and is now proving why after storming to victory to top off a stellar weekend at Hampton Downs in the second round of the championship.

The Red Bull star has now extended his lead to closest title challenger Zack Scoular, with 164 points to his name heading into the next event at Manfeild.

Speaking on his recent victory, Lindblad stated: "The start was a bit difficult, and it was a bit hairy in turn one,"

"The first two laps were tricky but I then settled into a nice rhythm and started to build the gap.

"It wasn’t easy as the gap was small, and any mistake I made would have let Zack in. So it was pretty tough.

"I’m here to win races, though, so I’m happy with the result."

Written by

Kerry Violet - F1 News Editor

Having graduated from the University of Sheffield with a 2:1 in Journalism in 2022, Kerry continued her pursuit of finding a full-time position in motorsport through work with the F1 Arcade in London, where she got to meet true fans of the sport and make a live grand prix watch party memorable for them. It was here she realised her background in journalism and love of motorsport could be combined, going on to volunteer with the female-led platform Empoword Journalism. Having completed stints as a screen editor and sports editor, Kerry landed her first F1-specific editorial role with GPFans and has thoroughly enjoyed continuing to work more closely with the sport ever since. The access GPFans offers Kerry has allowed her to interview big names such as Naomi Schiff and David Coulthard and given her experiences she could only have dreamt of as a young F1 fan which she hopes to build on.

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Red Bull F2 Arvid Lindblad