The importance of testing and developing your racecraft: How I Race with Martinius Stenshorne

20 April 2026

Martinius Stenshorne is the next member of the grid to take us into the cockpit in his edition of How I Race.

The Rodin Motorsport driver opens up about the origin of his driving style, how important testing and the simulator are for his adaptation and much more.

SETUP PREFERENCE

“First of all, I'm not a big fan of understeer. I would say I like the car to have quite a good front end, especially in the mid-corner.

“Apart from that, I think you cannot have a car that is too much in that one direction as well, so it's about finding the right balance. But for sure, if anything, I like the car to be a bit more loose in the rear than having too much understeer.

“I think the best car I've driven wasn't in a certain direction balance-wise.”

Stenshorne revealed his preference for a car with slightly more oversteer

KARTING DEVELOPMENT

“Karting is all about racecraft. It’s about the way you drive because it is still not so far away from single seaters. It's quite similar, but I think mainly it’s about the racecraft.

“But with all the driving you learn, you still have a lot more help in formulas than you do in karting. You have an engineer that tells you exactly what to do as well, so I think about the racecraft quite a bit, how to do starts and also race with others.

“It's always the difficult situation to be in during the races. You can have someone behind pushing to try to overtake you, but you want to save your tyres, so it's about finding the right balance.

“You don't want to use all your tyres too early either so you just have to do as best as you can and try to keep the guy behind whilst not using your tyres too much.”

Stenshorne talked about the valuable lessons from karting that have helped him in single seaters

THE VALUE OF TESTING

“Testing is quite important. It's not always so easy, especially when you come to a new track with a new car as well, to learn everything before qualifying.

“So, it's a bit easier when you have a few sessions to get used to everything. But also the simulator prep before the weekend is quite important, just to know how you want to do everything.

“I think most of the preparation though comes from the simulator. Also looking at onboards and data from previous years and seeing how other people are doing it.

“But usually the track is not always so good in FP, so you kind of have to build into it and the tyres are not the same as they are in qualifying. So, there's a few things to keep in mind, but the simulator is a good tool.”

The Norwegian driver spoke about how much he is enjoying driving for Rodin

ADAPTING AS A ROOKIE

“In each category I've been in I have been with the same team, so I haven't changed teams in the same category. So, I don't really know about adapting between cars in the same championship and having to drive it differently.

“But so far with Rodin, I'm feeling quite comfortable with the car.”