British racing driver Jamie Chadwick, who won the inaugural all-female W Series The W Series has captured the attention of many motorsport enthusiasts and drivers from around the world writes Ruth Nugent If I am to be completely honest, I wasn’t 100% sure of how I felt about W Series when it was first announced. The reason for this was purely one thing – I didn’t believe in a benefit from gender segregation within Motorsport. When I look back now I consider this quite a close-minded statement but after thirteen years being involved in Motorsport and fighting to be seen as an equal, I just couldn’t see all the positives the W Series was predicting. What is the W Series? However, I was intrigued and followed the progress of the series right through from the driver selection process to every free practice session and race. I began to follow numerous young female drivers who were selected for the series on various social media platforms to learn more about how they were benefitting from earning a place in this new all-female F3 championship and from very soon on it became evident how much these already talented drivers were benefitting from the championship. The Drivers It’s fair to say that early on in the season my attitude towards the championship changed to more of an auspicious perspective and I was interested to see what was to come. Firstly, and what I as a race driver myself would consider the most favourable part of being awarded a seat in this championship, is that each drivers entire seasons racing is covered financially. The cost behind getting behind the wheel and out on track as most of you know can be hugely expensive and sponsorship can be challenging to get so a free seasons racing is like winning the lotto for these young female drivers! They each have their own car (Tatuus F3 T-318) and a team of engineers and mechanics and throughout the season, they swap cars and engineers with the aim of learning the most they can from what the teams have to offer. Each driver gets the opportunity to race on five different circuits around Europe and gain as much championship points as possible. Another interesting and exciting consideration about the W Series is that the drivers that finish within the...