Tackling her first international campaign, Uruguayan talent Maite Cáceres lands a seat in the inaugural season of the F1 Academy championship, joining Campos Racing.
The announcements of the new F1 Academy championship, which is aimed to create a new pathway for young female drivers at Formula 4 level up the single-seater ladder, are starting to offer a clearer outline of the starting grid of the inaugural season.
One of the five highly-ranked teams selected for the launch of the all-female championship, Campos Racing signed W Series front runner Nerea Marti and former Spanish F4 driver Lola Lovinfosse – and is now the first squad to complete its line up by adding another talented up-and-coming driver to its roster: Uruguayan Maite Cáceres.
”I’m really excited to be working with Campos Racing, which has such a rich history in motorsport, for this year" - said Maite. "This past month I´ve been in close contact with them and I can really see the determination and the compromise the team have, values which I share. We will continue working to achieve our goals together."
Cáceres, 19, is one of Uruguay's brightest hopefuls in single seaters and will enter only her second season in open wheel racing, after racing in karting in her native Uruguay for a little over one year. Her career in the sport has in fact been a quick rise and, in 2022, Cáceres took part in the W Series selections in Arizona, at Inde Motorsports Ranch.
Her adaptation to Formula 4 machinery continued with a series of tests before she signed with International Motorsport for the full F4 US campaign.
In the American championship, Cáceres improved significantly over the course of the season and scored a P12 as a best finish at Road America and then a series of 15th place finishes at the COTA finale, despite having missed a few rounds in between.
The Uruguayan driver also joined selected races of the new USF Juniors, a series that employed the same Ligier F4 first gen cars but that is part of the Road To Indy program.
Over two weekends at Road America and COTA, she recorded two P11 and a P12 as personal bests.
Despite her limited experience in race cars, Cáceres comes from a family with deep roots in the sport; both her father and brother were racing drivers - as her older brother Juan tested with Minardi F1 in 2005 and contested a race in Champ Car.
Maite competed in a plethora of different sports before eventually getting behind the wheel herself, finally pursuing her passion.
Cáceres is now fully committed to continue her progress in the newly launched all-female championship, having joined Campos Racing for the inaugural season.
Maite was invited to the second round of the Formula Winter Series at Circuit Ricardo Tormo, Valencia, and, despite a late call, she had a very positive weekend scoring two top ten finishes at her European racing debut. She then decided to continue her journey with Campos.
“I would like to welcome Maite to Campos Racing", Team Principal Adrián Campos added. "She is a driver who we have closely followed for some time due to her talent and plenty of room for improvement. Alongside Nerea [Martí] and Lola [Lovinfosse], we have put together a very strong team to fight for top results throughout the 2023 F1 Academy season."
"We still have some further weeks of intense work ahead to prepare the opening round in Spielberg at the end of April. We want to make sure we arrive in Austria in the best possible way in terms of performance.”
While she will have to continue learn the new Tatuus T-421, Maite Cáceres will be able to rely on the expertise of the Spanish team, which therefore confirms its first driver of its line up.
Campos has historically provided opportunities to female racing drivers - also on the F1 ladder - and has a brilliant record with the new gen Tatuus F4 car, having claimed the title in the Spanish Championship in both the drivers and teams' standings in the debut season of the new car.
The format of the new F1 Academy will grant increased track-time to the drivers, with a 7-event calendar featuring triple headers, as well as at least 15 official test days. The championship is set to kick off in Austria on 28-29 April, for the first triple header.
