The dream, not so hidden, of the leaders of Formula 1 is to be able to see one in the next few years female driver taking part in a Grand Prix. However, the strong push to encourage the inclusion and entry of girls into motorsport is proceeding with great difficulty. The W Series, an all-female championship born in 2019, has tried and is trying to trace the path, but the fact that the 2022 season had to close early by canceling the last two rounds of the season due to lack of funds does not leave us too calm about what the future of the series will be.
Now, however, the Circus world has also decided to try to address this important issue directly. Not by investing in the W Series, which will remain an independent championship – albeit in support of F1 races – but by creating a new preparatory category, also open only to girls. The official announcement came from the official F1 channels themselves which also explained in detail how the new championship will work. In the ‘hierarchical pyramid’ the new series, which will take the name of F1 Academywill be the fourth in order of level, below F1, F2 and F3.
The first season will take place as early as next year, in 2023, and will have 15 cars on the track, managed by five different teams that will come from F2 and F3. The calendar will be quite busy with seven rounds of the season in which three races will be held per weekend. Overall, therefore, there will be 21 seasonal appointments. To these will also be added 15 days of official tests. Given that raising financial resources has always been a major obstacle to the advent of female drivers, Formula 1 has decided to subsidize each car with a budget of €150,000 (€2.25 million in total) and will ask pilots to cover the same amount, which “represents a fraction of the usual costs in a similar series”. The rest of the budget will be paid by the teams.
The car used for the series will have a Tatuus T421 frame. The 165 horsepower turbocharged engine will be supplied by Autotecnica, while Pirelli will supply the tyres. The series will not compete with the W Series but will aim to act as a springboard for young female drivers, taking them from karting and the ‘smaller’ categories to then train them and help them access the motorsport pyramid. be it the F3, F2 or the W Series itself. The target is to fill the gap with young male drivers, who statistically at the same age as the girls have – to date – been able to build up much greater motoring experience.
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