AIX Racing 2024 Review: A difficult but rewarding season

AIX Racing Team Principal Morne Reinecke admits the 2024 season was not an easy one for him and the team, but it was one where he feels they made plenty of progress as a unit.
A change of name halfway through the year brought with it a change of leadership and Reinecke says the start of his reign was not easy as they sought to put their stamp on things.
On the racing side of things, the season did not get off to the best of starts as they were last in the Teams’ Standings with just eight points after the first seven rounds.
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But they ended the year in much better form, scoring 27 points across the final three rounds to finish 2024 ninth in the Championship.
Reflecting on the year, Reinecke said: “Difficult. That’s probably the best way to summarise the year, difficult. Picking up, taking over, putting in new systems, platforms, and processes in place was quite difficult for us.
“I think it showed in the results although towards the end of the season we started showing some glimmers of progress.
“Obviously it’s not an exact science what we are doing. We are pulling in a certain direction in the hope of improving things and sometimes generally things cannot work out the way you want, but we are pretty satisfied with the processes and systems and the people we have put in place.”
Their comeback in the final three rounds started in Budapest where Nikita Bedrin won the Sprint Race ahead of Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak, giving the team their first one-two finish in the Championship.
“There is never a better thing than an unexpected weekend,” said Reinecke. “It’s not that we didn’t think it was possible but obviously with the way things were at the point in time you don’t know.
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“I was very, very happy with that result, the boys were happy with that result, the team was happy with that result but all round it was also important just for morale.
“It’s no secret that the team we took over, the guys behind the scenes that never get seen, it was a big win for them, more than just for the boys itself.”
That was Bedrin’s only victory of the year, but it went alongside four other much needed points finishes. In his second campaign in FIA Formula 3, he scored 25 of AIX’s 35 points in 2024, and Reinicke has nothing but kind things to say about the 19-year-old.
“I mean if you look at Nikita as a reference driver, he did his job very well, dealing with his own constraints and constraints of the car, as per normal, as everybody does,” continued Reinecke.
“I had a long conversation with him in Monza just to thank him for his efforts because he really stuck it out. Sometimes the drivers have good days and sometimes the teams have good days but on the odd days when those two combine, it’s brilliant.
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“But on the days where the team was struggling or lagging a little bit, he was always able to pick up the slack, so happy days and happy to have with the team.”
So why were AIX not able to match those Budapest results more often? Well, Reinecke highlighted their tyre warmup issues in Qualifying as the start of their problems which usually led to difficulties for his rookies Inthraphuvasak and Joshua Dufek.
“I think it’s also just a lot of our boys are new on the scene, so the science of the tyre and the warmup is new,” he added.
“To get the tyres in the window is not the easiest thing in the world and as the season progresses the guys obviously have a little bit more time, get to learn the tyres better and also get comfortable in their own space, and everyone wants to impress for the future.
“My opinion, not from the team, but my individual opinion, I sometimes find with the guys, they struggle with the pressure and just over push a little bit too much.
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“But I think towards the end of the season they started calming down a little bit, allowing the guys to actually just illustrate what they were capable of without over pushing the car.”
Continuing to recap the year, Reinecke was asked for his favourite moment from 2024 and he replied: “If we look at the general hooray moments of where we achieved a really good result that will obviously be Hungary.”