The 2026 GB3 Championship season opener at Silverstone saw VRD Racing’s Nikita Bedrin take two victories from pole position. After the weekend’s final race, I caught up with the Russian driver to get his reaction.
Bedrin had a slow start off the line in race one and dropped to P4, a position that he didn’t stay in for long as he soon regained one spot to Deagen Fairclough around the outside of Stowe. Bedrin overtook Maxim Rehm on the entry of the same corner two laps later, with his race-winning move coming on Lap 6 when he dived down the inside of Martin Molnár at Vale. After a short safety car for a stopped Dante Vinci, Bedrin took the chequered flag ahead of Molnár and Rehm.
Bedrin lost the lead to Fairclough at the start, but quickly took it back from the Hitech driver into Chapel. Despite two safety car deployments for a stopped Peter Bouzinelos and mechanical issues for Fairclough, Bedrin remained unchallenged for the rest of the race. He finished ahead of Rehm and Jin Nakamura.
“Coming into this weekend, I didn’t expect that we would be this quick,” Bedrin said. “But we found really good pace in the practice sessions. So [I’m] really really happy with the team and the work they’ve done.”
Bedrin initially finished the reverse-grid race in P5, but was later given a five-second penalty for performing burnouts after crossing Safety Car Line 1, situated at Woodcote. He was classified in P11.
“Of course I expected a bit more from the last race,” he said. “But we didn’t have the pace as much as the other guys that saved the tyres for the last race. But apart from that, I think we’ve done a really good job and I’m really happy with how it went.”
Outside of his GB3 commitments, Bedrin is also a development driver for DS Penske in Formula E. He joined the team in June last year and his main duties include simulator support during race weekends. He first sampled the team’s Gen3 Evo car in that year’s Berlin rookie test, where he finished 14th overall with a 0:58.176 from the morning session.
Bedrin’s first 2026 test outing was in Free Practice 0 – the championship’s annual rookie-only free practice session, held before a weekend’s official sessions – at the Miami E-Prix, where he finished fifth with a 0:56.245. His latest was in the rookie test during the Madrid E-Prix weekend, where he finished third in the morning session with a 1:29.628 and fastest in the afternoon with a 1:29.250. He was classified second-fastest overall.
“The team gave me a good run plan so I could be quick on the new tyres, [and] of course everything went really good,” Bedrin said. “It’s a tricky car to drive and it was also a difficult track, so it was a difficult combination. But I think I’ve adapted pretty well, and we ended the day fastest!”
You can follow Nikita Bedrin and VRD Racing on their social media pages below:
https://www.instagram.com/nikitabedrin1_
https://www.instagram.com/vrdracing
Many thanks to Josh Robinson for providing the header image. You can see more of his portfolio on his website and social media pages:
https://joshrobinsonphotos.myportfolio.com
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