Where Does Türkiye Stand on the Road from Karting to F1?

Karting
Author: Lütfi Mete Odabaşı
Creation: 12 October 2026

In Türkiye, the lower rungs of the karting ladder are solid, but only a handful of young drivers manage to open the door to Europe.

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Hello! If you woke up one morning asking "How do you become an F1 driver, and where does Türkiye stand in this?", you are in the right place. The short answer is this: the lower rungs of the ladder - karting tracks, training camps and national championships - are truly alive in Türkiye; but the doors of the Italy- and UK-centered karting ecosystem are only just beginning to crack open for a handful of Turkish youngsters. We will look at everything that is pushing those doors open and what is squeezing through them.

Highlights

At least 6 rounds were held in the 2026 Türkiye Karting Championship; at the 6th round in Tuzla, 37 athletes in 4 categories took to the track.
F1 returns to Istanbul Park on October 3, 2027 - a big opportunity window for young drivers.
In the FIA's first Arrive and Drive European Championship, 21 junior drivers from 14 nationalities are competing.
For the FIA Super Licence, over the last three years at least 40 points are required.
10-year-old Ilyas Sami became the 2026 IAME Euro Series X30 Mini champion.

How to Become an F1 Driver: The Rungs of the Ladder

The classic roadmap is simple but exhausting: karting → Formula 4 → Formula 3 → Formula 2 → F1. F2 is the final step immediately before F1; nearly all modern F1 drivers have come through it. Karting is the kindergarten of this ladder - some even call it "F1's kindergarten". To draw an analogy, if you think of F1 as university, karting is the first letters children write.

The age categories are also clear: on the FIA side, OK-Junior is for ages 12-14, while OK is for ages 14 and up - the seniors' first grade. Licences are also graded by age: for junior categories Grade G, and for the OK class Grade F and E. The FIA Karting Academy Trophy also expanded into two categories in 2025: 12-14 age Juniors and the newly opened 14-16 age Senior.

How does a race weekend go? Free practice, official qualifying, then heats - that is, qualifying series -, followed by the superheat and the final. Some championships have a single-race format. So karting is not just "step on the gas"; it is a mini F1 weekend with qualifying tactics, heat mathematics and final pressure. One more warning: jumping straight from karting to F1 at 17 is technically possible but practically impossible - by that age, contemporary rivals have long since moved on to open-wheel series.

The official key to reaching F1 is the FIA Super Licence: a driver must accumulate at least 40 points within the three years preceding the year of application. These points come from results in series such as F3 and F2. If you want to see what is happening at the top: McLaren junior Dries Van Langendonck won the FIA Karting European Championship and took the summit of the FIA International Karting ranking; on the Williams side, Will Green became the 2026 FIA Karting European Championship Junior champion. This is how names are born on the line stretching from karting to F1.

Karting Infrastructure in Türkiye: Tracks, Clubs, Championships

Now let's return to the map. The heart of national karting in Türkiye beats under TOSFED: the 2026 MOTUL Türkiye Karting Championship is being held, along with a separate teams' championship. The first round of the season was organized by the Kocaeli Karting and Automobile Sports Club at the TOSFED Körfez Race Track; the third round lasted two days under the hosting of Bursa Metropolitan Municipality. The sixth round, meanwhile, was run at the Tuzla Karting Track through the Tuzla Motorsports Club: micro, mini, junior and senior categories with 37 athletes. In Senior, Erin Ünlüdoğan won, and in Junior, Rüzgar Tırınk took victory. On the sponsorship front, alongside MOTUL there are names such as Spor Toto, Tuzla Municipality and AVIS - so it's not just enthusiasts; there is corporate support in the field too.

There is movement on the Rotax front as well: rounds 3 and 4 of the Rotax Max Challenge Türkiye were held in October at the Körfez Karting Track, with 21 drivers in 4 categories , and the goal is to award the winners a slot in the Rotax Grand Final. In other words, there is another side door leading to Europe for Turkish drivers.

Facility	Where	What it offers
TOSFED Körfez Karting Track	Kocaeli	Main hub of the Türkiye Championship and Rotax rounds
Tuzla Karting Park	Istanbul (Akfırat)	A 930-meter professional licensed track, karting training for all ages
TOSFED Istanbul Park	Istanbul (Tuzla)	An international race track laid in 2003; a separate karting track plan has not been completed
Regional academies	Ankara, Antalya, Kastamonu, etc.	Driving position, throttle-brake control, starts, overtaking training

Karting schools and training camps

The education side is broader than I thought. The Istanbul Motorsports Club has been providing karting training since 2006; TOSFED's "First Step to F1" karting training camp was held six terms under the leadership of Naci Süalp and targets the 7-11 age group. At Tuzla Karting Park, TMK offers participants of all ages an 8-lesson individual karting training. The TOSFED Karting Academy Trainings were held in Körfez, and Italian driver Lorenzo Travisanutto, a European Karting Champion, reunited with young Turkish athletes - not just a charming detail, but where networking begins.

The picture in Anatolia is also promising: there are karting training programs in Ankara, club activities in Antalya, karting-sim theoretical trainings by the METU Motorsports Community, and a free event in Kastamonu organized by a club saying "we don't charge fees." T1 Racing Academy teaches technical topics from driving position to track discipline; MAS Karting Academy gives training opportunities to talents who break track records. In other words, the first rung of the ladder is not empty.

Young Turkish Drivers on European Tracks

So what happens after the first track? Here is the critical question. The names answering it are few for now but bright: Ilyas Sami, a 10-year-old Turkish Cypriot driver living in England, won the 2026 IAME Euro Series X30 Mini Championship. Alp Aksoy, meanwhile, at age 7 By winning the European Karting Championship in Austria, he was described as "the youngest Turkish driver to win a race." Are these exceptions? Right now, yes. But they are not the only ones: according to one news report, 12 Turkish athletes will compete on European circuits across 4 different series; all of them names rising from the mini category of the Türkiye Karting Championship.

Turks are also present in the bigger picture. Borusan Otomotiv Motorsport is the first and only team representing Türkiye for 6 consecutive seasons in the GT4 European Series; in 2026, young driver Batı Yıldırım joined the team, and the goal is to compete in two different international karting series in Europe. Ayhancan Güven, as a Red Bull athlete, won the Indy 8 Hours, the final round of the Intercontinental GT Challenge. Seda Kaçan Bakan is referred to as the first Turkish female racing driver to become European Champion, and in 2026 she won a race in the AVIS Türkiye Circuit Championship with Texaco Team AMS. Güneş Işıkalp, meanwhile, drew attention in Cappadocia as a member of the Turkrent DNR Karting Team. The picture conveyed in a column is also striking: it states that four young Turkish drivers came from karting, two of them still race in karting, one competes in a Formula series, and the other in an Audi cup.

The Cost Reality: How Heavy Is the Burden on Families?

Bir F2 sezonunun bedeli yaklaşık 2 milyon euro; dünyanın en yetenekli çocuğu bile ailesinin cüzdanı yetmezse merdivende takılıp kalıyor.

Since the ladder exists, why can't everyone climb it? The answer: money. Let's first look at the entry level for recreational use - the picture in classified ads goes like this: a simple go-kart in the 10,000 TL range, a model with an extra 7HP engine at 50,000 TL, and an electric Segment e-go-kart around 120,000 TL . A session at the track starts at figures like 500 TL. On the spare parts front, components such as the front bumper and protection bar start at tens of thousands of lira. These are hobby vehicles; but no official figure in Turkish has been published regarding a racing chassis and season budget - and acknowledging this gap is important.

The price of the international ladder is even more ambitious: according to estimates circulating in forums, an F3 season costs roughly 1 million EUR, F2 about 2 million EUR , and a journey from karting to F1 around 5-6 million EUR in total. There is no official confirmation of these figures and they should be read as "claims" - but they give a fair idea of the scale. A child who could become the world's best driver stalling on the ladder depending on their family's wallet... This is exactly the issue the FIA is grappling with: emphasizing that keeping karting accessible is its own responsibility, the FIA launched the first Arrive and Drive European Championship for precisely this purpose - team rental, all equipment included in the organization. In 2026, 21 junior drivers from 14 nationalities are racing in this format. This may be the most vivid answer to the accessibility debate.

Why Aren't We Asking Whether Türkiye Still Produces F1 Drivers?

The question "Why can't Türkiye produce a Formula 1 driver?" has been on the agenda for a long time, and part of the answer lies hidden in the grassroots. It was discussed that a separate karting track should be built within the Istanbul Park grounds, but the completion date remains unclear. The federation side also states that it operates with a limited budget and registered clubs - in other words, the reason is this: the first rungs of the ladder (tracks, camps, the national championship) are standing, but the gaps between the rungs, namely the financing of the transition to European series, is largely left to families and private teams.

The good news: a catalyst is on the way. Formula 1 returns to Istanbul Park on October 3, 2027 - The FIA calendar has been officially announced. Such a weekend could push sponsors, clubs, and perhaps your family to look at the karting track. One piece of practical advice: if you are between the ages of 7 and 14, there is no obstacle to starting with TMK, IMK, or a regional academy. With free events available even in Kastamonu, the only real requirement to start is curiosity.

So What Exactly Is Türkiye's Missing Piece?

Let me summarize. Strengths: a national championship living within TOSFED that runs on its own feet; professional licensed tracks in Korfez and Tuzla; training camps from age 7 onward and a wave of young talent carrying dozens of athletes to Europe. Missing pieces: the karting track inside Istanbul Park is still just a plan; there is no official transparency about race season budgets; and that "second-life transition" that is de facto mandatory in the Italy- and UK-based series for international recognition is mostly left to families' pockets.

So the picture is neither black nor rosy: the bottom of the ladder is solid, the top is bumpy. But if a child like Ilyas Sami can become champion in IAME Europe, the doors are not locked - the key is just expensive. If it were you, when would you take the first step? In my opinion, set aside a single track day before filling out the registration form; the rest usually follows on its own.