Four new judges join the Women’s World Car of the Year Panel

Odiel Mennink, The Netherlands

Four new judges have been appointed to the jury panel for the Women’s World Car of the Year.

Four new judges have been appointed to the jury panel for the Women’s World Car of the Year to extend the number of judges to 21 and the number of countries represented within the awards structure to twelve.  Each judge is high profile in her own country and will be voting for this year’s awards which will be announced in the third quarter of the year.

 Malin Brand, Iceland  –   www.mbl.is

 Malin is a journalist and assistant editor at Pressan, and was a news reporter for the National Broadcast Service in Finland. She is currently with Morgunblaðið where she writes and does photo shoots for the weekly car magazine, testing new cars, writing about technology and interviewing.

She has contested enduro racing and is competing in the Icelandic Rally this year with the intention to establish the first women’s rally team in 2015.

Jenni Kurki-Suonio, Finland  – www.jennikrohn.com     

Jenni has a BSc in engineering from Metropolia University of Applied Sciences.  She was a test driver for Finland’s leading automotive magazine , carrying out multiple comparison tests including two 12-day winter tests in Lapland.

She has raced everything from karts to open wheel formula cars. She was nominated Finland’s best female driver in 2004 and won Rookie of the Year in 2007 in the Legends Trophy Series.

When she was team manager of The Metropolia Motorsport Team in the Formula Student (SAE) project they were recognised with an award by the Finnish car racing association. She worked with Carlin Motorsport in England for two six-month periods in Formula 3, Formula Renault and Formula BMW as a mechanic.

Maria Leitner, Italy  –  mleitner@hotmail.com  

In 1990 she began to follow Formula One racing for Telemontecarlo Television, presenting from the pits, and so became the first woman journalist in Italy as a presenter of Formula One programs.  Her years following Formula One were those when Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost and Nigel Mansell were racing. She says she didn’t lack for excitement and the words to convey it.  She later commented to MTV’s live coverage of the German Deutsche Tourenwagen Meistershaft with the driver Emanuele Pirro .

Since 2012 she has been the anchorwoman of the night news of TG2 , alternating with other colleagues.   Today, she says from following motor sport and making friends through the sport means her passion has only increased.  The difference now is her passion has become her work.

Odiel Mennink, The Netherlands  –  www.femmefrontaal.nl 

 Odiel Mennink is a car journalist and the founder of femmefrontaal.nl, a Dutch website that focuses on the female perspective on cars. As a car journalist, she wrote for AutoVisie/Telegraaf, Testauto, and several lifestyle magazines and she was nominated for the Dutch online VIVA400 award in 2013. In her spare time she races as a guest driver in the Mazda MaX5 Cup in The Netherlands.

She says that in The Netherlands, over 36% of car owners are female and the number is growing every day and, because of the strict Dutch tax system she believes women want and need to get good value-for-money with their cars.

She is actively involved in road safety as a consultant to various Italian institutions including the Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of Environment. She has raced in four events of the famous Mille Miglia and won the Rally of Monza as copilot for Marco Brandt in the official Team Lancia 037.  She still helps at some FIA events and wrote the book The Art of Driving with Robert Gurian and two-time World Rally Champion Miki Biasion.

WOMEN’S WORLD CAR OF THE YEAR JUDGES

For more information on the Women’s World Car of the Year check out the official website, facebook page or follow on twitter 

22nd May 2014