F2’s Zane Maloney made the right choice walking away with title on the line

OPINION: Two rounds and four races remain in this year’s Formula 2 championship, but one title protagonist will miss the final event to pursue a different career path. Taking a pragmatic view of his Formula 1 prospects and not delaying his latest challenge in Formula E could pay huge dividends, even if

immediate success may be a stretch

With an approximate population of just over a quarter of a million people and its remote Caribbean location, it’s not surprising that Barbados is hardly well-known for its motorsport heritage. But Zane Maloney’s exploits have begun to change that.

The young Barbadian cut his teeth at the family-owned Bushy Park Circuit and the island’s primary facility for racing. And in two months time, the 21-year-old is set to make his Formula E debut, having signed for the Abt team at an interesting juncture in his life.

Maloney has worked his way up the junior single-seater ranks to Formula 2 and, in theory, just one big leap away from Formula 1. Along the way, his abilities have certainly not gone unnoticed by motorsport’s upper echelons.

Maloney was previously on Red Bull’s books and has been part of Sauber’s Academy during 2024. During a barren season for the Swiss squad in F1, the only time its distinctive black and green colours have been at the sharp end of a grid have been courtesy of Maloney, who remains in F2 title contention after an up-and-down campaign.

A double win in the Bahrain season-opener and five more podiums have kept him in the hunt, but a 34.5-point deficit with just 78 available across the remaining two rounds means that realistically it’s unlikely Maloney will be able to mount a comeback against leader Gabriel Bortoleto.

Maloney will still compete in the upcoming Qatar event with Rodin at the end of November. But even if he were to bring the title further within reach, he would miss the Abu Dhabi finale due to a clashing commitment with Formula E’s season-opener in Brazil on 7 December.

“I think it’s been a good year, we struggled for maybe one or two rounds on pace and then it’s things outside of our control that happen in championships in general,” Maloney tells Motorsport.com. “Maybe we had a bit more of that this year than what we had hoped for so that kind of put us on the back foot.

Maloney has been unable to replicate the sensational form he managed with a double victory in the Bahrain opener

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

“Up until the last couple of rounds, we were in the fight. I do still think we’re in the fight, but I’m now moving my focus over to this [Formula E] opportunity, which then takes me back out the fight. It’s been a year of being in the fight, being out of the fight, but I’ve always pushed as hard as I can and the team have been doing a great job.

“I feel like I’m driving at a very high level. We won’t have that championship to show for it, but I think everyone who needs to know what happened this year knows and that’s the main point.”

As far back as 2019 when he won the British F4 title with Carlin, Maloney’s career has been on an upward trajectory. He only just missed out on the 2022 F3 title in his debut season to Victor Martins after a late surge that yielded victories in each of the last three feature races. Even so Maloney bested 2025 Haas F1 driver Oliver Bearman and Bortoleto’s closest challenger Isack Hadjar, who turned out for Red Bull in FP1 at Silverstone.

“I’m just grateful to get this seat with this amazing team and I’m just looking forward to the opportunity to do the best job I can”

Zane Maloney

Winning the F2 title this season would still likely not have meant a seat in the pinnacle of the sport for Maloney though, as fellow Sauber Academy driver Theo Pourchaire’s case proves. The Frenchman claimed the title last season having finished runner-up the previous year, but it did nothing to elevate his position as a candidate to join the F1 grid.

That may change in the highly unlikely event he is selected above Bortoleto, Valtteri Bottas and Franco Colapinto to partner Nico Hulkenberg at the team next year. But the 21-year-old currently resembles something of a forgotten man. He has been left in limbo around an IndyCar drive with Arrow McLaren and his career has lost all momentum.

A move into Formula E is also somewhat logical for Maloney. For the last two seasons, he has acted as Andretti’s reserve and development driver, taking part in rookie test sessions and gathering a wealth of data ahead of his debut this season.

Maloney will now follow fellow F2 race winner Taylor Barnard into the championship this season, the 20-year-old Briton having won the Monaco sprint race with AIX Racing. Barnard made three appearances for McLaren last term in place of the injured Sam Bird, and after impressing with two points finishes in Berlin, has been signed up full-time for the 2024-25 campaign.

Fellow F2 race winner Taylor Barnard has shown that the adaption to Formula E can reap results, even with limited preparation

Photo by: Sam Bagnall / Motorsport Images

With manufacturer involvement, quality drivers and ever-increasing car speeds, Formula E has begun to turn itself into a desirable destination for young drivers with talent but perhaps not the opportunities or backing of their contemporaries to reach F1.

But moving into Formula E certainly doesn’t mean that any hope of a future F1 seat is completely out of the question either. That is evidenced by drivers including Alex Albon, who jumped from Nissan before the season got under way to Toro Rosso, and Nyck de Vries, who joined AlphaTauri having won the title in 2020-21.

“It’s clear that in motorsports in general now, in any championship at a professional level, there’s a lot more drivers than there are seats,” says Maloney. “So I’m just grateful to get this seat with this amazing team and I’m just looking forward to the opportunity to do the best job I can.”

Rookies have generally struggled to get to grips with Formula E’s unique style of racing, which consists of peloton-style races, all while having to conserve energy to fine margins. While Maloney will be the least experienced driver on the grid, having yet to start a Formula E race, he will compete alongside championship stalwart Lucas di Grassi, who with 131 starts has only missed one race in the category’s 10-year history.

The Brazilian endured his worst season in the championship last term, only scoring four points and having been comprehensively beaten by Nico Muller, who has left for Andretti and become a Porsche factory driver. But in di Grassi, Maloney will have a strong benchmark to compare himself against and, perhaps more importantly, learn from. That knowledge could become key as Abt embarks on a new journey with powertrain supplier Lola and Yamaha.

This season also coincides with the start of the Gen3 Evo era, with cars running a softer Hankook tyre compared with last year, while all-wheel-drive (AWD) will be used in certain situations such as qualifying duels, start of the race and Attack Modes. It means the new version of the car is several seconds faster than its predecessor, but it being somewhat of a new starting point for all teams and drivers could be the perfect opportunity for Maloney to make his mark.

The Abt/Lola/Yamaha partnership is highly unlikely to be challenging for wins from the outset or possibly even podiums, but Maloney will be aware of this and to some extent, it will mean something of a less scrutinised debut campaign. But on the flip side, being involved in a project from the outset and helping to lay the foundations could pay huge dividends for his career, not only in Formula E, but further afield in motorsport.

Maloney will have a lot to learn on his new Formula E journey, but getting involved from the start of the Yamaha-Lola powertrain will aid his own development

Photo by: Abt/Lola

“[AWD] changes the balance of the car, it changes how you have to drive the car,” Maloney explains. “I guess it all depends on how each team adapts to that and I think as its new it’s also good for me because everyone’s learning it and it’s not just me.

“It’s one thing that everyone’s a rookie at, which is cool. I drove it a bit in the last couple of weeks and, yeah, it is very different. It’s going to take time to kind of understand and perfect how to be fast with the four-wheel-drive in 350kW and I’m sure that’s one of the main topics of most teams down the grid right now.

“For us it’s a bit more than that, of course, coming in as a new manufacturer [with Lola and Yamaha]. But we’re flat out at work trying to come into the start of the season as high up the grid as we can be, even though we don’t know where that is right now.”