Théophile Naël: From winning in Macau to Campos Racing with a single objective: The 2026 F3 title.
When Théophile Naël arrived in Macau in November 2025, he was not going to win. He was not the favourite. He was not leading any championship. He was an 18-year-old driver who had just finished...
When Théophile Naël arrived in Macau in November 2025, he was not going to win. He was not the favourite. He was not leading any championship. He was an 18-year-old driver who had just finished eighth in his first Formula 3 season and had travelled to the most dangerous street circuit on the junior calendar to gain experience before 2026. What he did next changed everything.
In the final two laps of the 2025 Macau Grand Prix, with the safety car neutralising the pack and three drivers compressed in search of victory, Naël executed a double overtake at Lisboa, one of the circuit’s most demanding corners, to go from third to first in a single manoeuvre. There was no time to react. The race ended under the safety car. Naël was the 2025 FIA FR World Cup champion. The biggest victory of his young career.
Two weeks later in Melbourne on March 6th 2026, he set pole in his first qualifying session with Campos Racing with a time of 1:34.187, edging teammate Ugochukwu by 21 thousandths of a second in the session’s final moment. The talent of this Frenchman from Saint-Étienne is not accidental. It has a name, a history and a perfectly drawn trajectory that starts on the karting tracks of France and reaches all the way to the 2026 F3 constructors’ champion team.
Origins: Saint-Étienne, karting and the first steps in France
Théophile Guy Yannick Naël was born on June 22nd 2007 in Saint-Étienne, an industrial city in southeastern France in the Loire department, historically known for its coal mines and its football club AS Saint-Étienne. From a very young age Naël showed a natural inclination toward speed and karting was his first racing school.
In 2018, at barely 10 years old, he won the French Karting Championship in the Cadet category. Two years later in 2020 he repeated with the IAME X30 Junior title, another step on the French national karting ladder. He was a driver who won whenever he had the right car and the right conditions. The progression was natural and in 2022, at 15 years old, the moment arrived for his single-seater debut.
2022: The debut at 15 in Spanish F4
Naël made his first appearance in Spanish Formula 4 at the fourth round of the 2022 season with the Saintéloc Racing team at Spa-Francorchamps, barely a week after turning 15. It was an exploratory debut: four points scored, nineteenth in the final standings with 11 points. But the information gathered was enough for both him and the team to believe the following season could be completely different.
Saintéloc Racing, based in Alsace with a long history in French motorsport, would become his home for the following years. The mutual trust between driver and structure is one of the elements that explains the speed of his development.
2023: Spanish F4 champion at 15 years old
The 2023 Spanish Formula 4 season was Naël’s first full campaign in single-seaters. And it was dominant. With Saintéloc Racing the Frenchman won eight races, reached the podium on fourteen occasions, set five pole positions and five fastest laps. The title arrived before the end of the season with a 23 point advantage over second-placed Christian Ho.
The championship was an exercise in progressive domination. His first podium came in the second race at Spa. His first victory was at Aragón. From there Naël won six of the next nine races, making himself the undisputed championship leader. Consistency was the key: no retirements, no serious mistakes, no blank races during the decisive period.
Naël’s reaction after winning the title was telling: winning against rivals from Campos Racing and MP Motorsport is just unbelievable, he said. Two teams that would be his reference points in the years that followed and that, at that moment, represented the ceiling of competition in the category.
2024: Formula Regional and steady maturity
With the Spanish F4 title in hand, Naël stepped up to the Formula Regional European Championship in 2024, the series that acts as a bridge between F4 and F3. He stayed with Saintéloc Racing and also competed in the Middle East championship during the winter, accumulating kilometres on different circuits.
The European season was less dominant than the previous one but instructive. A notable victory at the Red Bull Ring in the second race of the Austrian round, a first pole at the final Monza round where he also took two fourth-place finishes. He finished ninth in the championship with 81 points. He also took part in that year’s Macau Grand Prix as part of his preparation for what was to come.
At the Formula 3 post-season tests in Jerez in October 2024, Naël drove the Dallara F3 2025 for the first time with Van Amersfoort Racing. The impression was good and in November 2024 his signing for the Dutch team for the 2025 F3 season was confirmed.
2025: The rookie who surprised the F3 paddock
The 2025 Formula 3 season was the first time Naël measured himself against the world’s best junior drivers on equal terms. Van Amersfoort Racing, one of the championship’s historic teams, gave him the ideal framework. And the Frenchman responded from the very first race.
Melbourne, round one. Naël qualified third, an extraordinary position for a debutant in a field with second and third-year drivers. In the wet Feature Race he demonstrated tactical maturity beyond his years: he made the right decisions at the right moments and finished on the podium. Third place in his first F3 race. Only a handful of drivers in the championship’s recent history have managed to reach the rostrum in their first weekend.
What followed was more uneven but no less instructive. The Bahrain, Imola and Monaco rounds were difficult. Technical issues, qualifying results that left him too far back on the grid, races recovered from unfavourable positions. The F3 championship does not forgive: the difference between qualifying fifth and twelfth can determine whether you finish in the points or outside them in the Feature Race.
But Barcelona was the turning point. Front row in qualifying, solid Feature Race performance, second place through a decisive overtake on Van Hoepen. Naël was capable of flying. And he proved it again at Silverstone, where he chose the correct compound in a race with changing conditions and made up seven positions in the opening lap to finish second in the Feature Race, his best result of the year.
He closed the 2025 season eighth in the championship with 72 points. The best result among Van Amersfoort Racing’s three drivers. A result that, given it was his first season in the category against a field including champion Câmara, runner-up Tsolov and Boya among others, was evaluated internally as a success and as the foundation for building 2026.
Macau 2025: The victory that changed everything
If Melbourne was the announcement, Macau was the confirmation. The November 2025 Macau Grand Prix is one of the most demanding events on the junior calendar: the Guia Circuit is narrow, technical, with a wall on each side and zero margin for error. The world’s best junior drivers gather there every November in a battle that combines raw speed with risk management.
Naël arrived in Macau with Saintéloc Racing in the KCMG by Pinnacle Motorsport team. In Friday’s qualifying he set pole position the same dominant single lap pace he had displayed throughout the F4 and F3 years ahead of a field that included Freddie Slater, Mari Boya and other prominent F3 names.
Saturday’s qualifying race was not as perfect. Naël dropped to third while Slater dominated from start to finish. For Sunday’s main race the Frenchman started from the front row but was overtaken by Boya in the opening lap. Slater at the front, Boya second, Naël third and fighting. The circuit did what it always does in Macau: create drama, safety cars, incidents and constantly redefine the race.
With two laps remaining, the safety car on track and three drivers compressed within tenths, Naël was third. At the restart, when the safety car pulled in and the circuit opened again, Naël did not wait. At Lisboa he took a different line to the rest, overtook Boya and Deligny in one single manoeuvre and moved into first. Seconds later a new accident brought the safety car back and the race ended frozen. Naël was the winner. The 2025 FIA FR World Cup champion. A victory achieved through a double overtake that some analysts described as the junior categories’ move of the year.
His post-race reflection was honest: he was not expecting it when he arrived. He just wanted to have a fun race, gain some experience for Monaco and for the following season. In the end, they won the race. The team deserved it. And personally, it changed his mindset for what was to come.
The Campos Racing signing and the clear 2026 objective
Before the 2025 F3 season had even ended, in September of that year, Naël’s signing with Campos Racing for 2026 was confirmed. The Valencia-based team had just won the F3 constructors’ championship for the first time in its history, with Câmara, Tsolov and Inthraphuvasak. The 2026 target was clear: defend that title.
Adrián Campos Jr., the team director, was explicit about why they chose Naël: he is a full F4 champion who demonstrates a fantastic ease of adaptation to any category, reaching the podium even as a debutant in all of them. The fit between team quality and driver quality was perfect.
Naël’s reaction was equally direct: Campos has been my rival for years and I have always respected their professionalism and admired their work. Having the opportunity to wear their colours is a real honour. And he added what everyone expected: I cannot wait to begin this new challenge together with the goal of fighting for the championship in 2026.
The winter of shared work was intense. Post-season Jerez tests, pre-season Barcelona tests. Naël and Ugochukwu pushing each other on the team simulator weeks before the season began.
2026: The Melbourne pole and the penalty that hurts
Naël’s 2026 season with Campos started exactly as it should have. In Friday qualifying at Melbourne, with his earlier laps deleted for track limit violations, the Frenchman saved his best lap for the final second. A 1:34.187 that edged teammate Ugochukwu by 21 thousandths. First with Campos. First pole of the season. A front-row lockout for the Spanish team.
The Sprint Race was as expected: starting twelfth due to the grid reversal, Naël focused on learning and gathering information for Sunday’s Feature Race, without taking risks.
Sunday arrived with him on the front row, ready for his first Formula 3 victory. What followed was one of the harshest injustices a driver can suffer: a five-second penalty for a false start, barely perceptible even in slow motion, that dropped him from second position to twelfth in the final classification. Two points instead of the eighteen he would have scored with the second place he held on track.
For Campos, for Naël and for the fans who watched the race, it was a result that did not reflect the reality of the weekend’s performance. AutoHebdo described it well: what could have been a breakthrough victory instead became a frustrating end to an otherwise promising weekend.
The Melbourne balance: pole in qualifying, strong race performance, two points from the penalty. Naël is eleventh in the championship with 2 points, but the potential demonstrated is among the highest on the entire grid. The next round is Monaco in June. The circuit he himself said Macau helped him prepare for.
Key quotes and curiosities
Naël to Feeder Series after winning the 2025 Macau GP: I was not expecting that when I came here. I just wanted to make a fun race, to take some experience for next season as well for Monaco, because we know that this track can be really helpful for Monaco. But at the end, we won the race.
Naël in the Campos Racing signing announcement: I am very happy to be joining Campos Racing for the 2026 FIA F3 season. It is a team I have always respected for its professionalism. I cannot wait to start this new challenge together with the goal of fighting for the championship in 2026.
Naël in the Melbourne 2026 post qualifying press conference to Pit Debrief: it was really, really stressful until the last lap. Knowing you had to improve in your final attempt is enormous pressure. But we did it.
Among the curiosities worth knowing: Naël’s full name is Théophile Guy Yannick, three distinctly French names of clear family tradition. Saint-Étienne, his birthplace, is the same city that gave French football one of its most historic clubs AS Saint-Étienne, speaking of a city with competitive DNA across multiple disciplines. Naël shares with Rafael Câmara the distinction of having set pole in his first qualifying session with Campos Racing with the exact same time of 1:34.187 a statistical coincidence that the paddock noted with surprise. And Saintéloc Racing, the team with which Naël won the Spanish F4 title and raced at Macau, is one of the longest-standing outfits in French motorsport, founded in Alsace with over three decades of nurturing French talent.
Sources: FIA Formula 3 official fiaformula3.com, Campos Racing official camposracing.com, Wikipedia Théophile Naël, Pit Debrief, Feeder Series, AutoHebdo, SoyMotor, MotorTime, Macau News, First Lap F1, Formula Scout
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