Patrick O'Donovan

Midway through 2020, O’Donovan graduated to the single-make RX150 Rallycross Championship for buggies within the British Rallycross Championship 5 Nations Trophy. He clinched the crown the following year while dovetailing his efforts with a permanent programme in the inaugural FIA RX2e Championship, placing fourth overall and reaching the rostrum in Sweden along the way.

His success earned him recognition as Motorsport UK’s Young Driver of the Year, and he proceeded to stun observers by scooping the runner-up spoils in his very first Supercar appearance at Lydden Hill. He joined Euro RX1 for the series’ 2022 curtain-raising contest in Hungary, behind the wheel of the same Ford Fiesta that his father – former British Rallycross Champion and Euro RX Supercar podium-finisher, Ollie O’Donovan – raced to third place in Catalunya in 2017.

That same season, O’Donovan won twice in RX2e on his way to fourth in the title chase again, often proving to be eventual champion Viktor Vranckx’s closest rival. He simultaneously lifted the British Championship laurels in the headlining Supercar class, prior to throwing his hat into the ring for a full campaign of Euro RX1 competition in 2023 in an ex-Hansen Motorsport Peugeot 208 WRX.

A maiden victory at Höljes and two further visits to the rostrum propelled him to third in the points table, before he joined the FIA World Rallycross Championship grid for the double-header finale in Hong Kong – impressively claiming a podium finish in only his second start at the discipline’s highest level.

2024 would prove to be a breakthrough year for the London-born racer, as he won three out of the four Euro RX1 rounds to sew up the FIA European Rallycross Championship title, while successfully defending his domestic crown. O’Donovan subsequently returned to World RX with a one-off outing in Türkiye, as the prelude to a full-season assault in 2025 in a sustainably-fuelled, combustion-engined Peugeot 208 run by Team RX Racing.