How W Series can confront its biggest enduring issue

Having won both of W Series’ two championships so far, Jamie Chadwick is the arguably the best-known woman currently racing. Winning four races in 2021 and two out of the six which took place in 2019, Chadwick is well-proven and has a broad resume outside single-seaters too - having won the British GT4 title back in 2016, and branched out this year into the Extreme E off-road series with Veloce - taking second in the Ocean X-Prix in Senegal.

But a question mark hangs over her future. Asked after securing the title in Austin what her plans were for next year, Chadwick was non-committal.

“I don’t know at the moment,” she said. “Of course, the opportunity W Series gives us all but particularly for me now as a double champion, is huge, so I’m going to relish that, take it as much as I can, and hopefully step forward into bigger things.”

In theory, she could return for a third year in W Series as one of the top eight drivers in the standings guaranteed a place on the grid next year - although that would result in her losing the 15 FIA Superlicence points she earned with this year’s title. But it would also seem to sell Chadwick short, with her proven track record deserving of a move into Formula 3, at the very least, and would prove a flaw in the system within which W Series operates.

Progressing through the feeder series is key to both Chadwick’s success and to that of W Series too. To prove its long-term viability, the championship needs to see its drivers graduate into the higher ranks of racing.

That won't be helped if Chadwick returns - which could also make things harder for younger drivers keen to prove themselves. The now-double champion, runner-up Alice Powell (28) and third-placed Emma Kimilainen (32) won all eight races between them in 2021. All have extensive single-seater experience - the latter was a podium-finisher in Formula Palmer Audi way back in 2009, and Powell was on the GP3 grid in 2012 - and left the rest to feed off scraps. While the likes of Fabienne Wohlwend and Irina Sidorkova have taken podiums, the last driver other to win a race was Marta Garcia at Norisring in 2019. Expected to push on and become a title contender in 2021, the Spaniard didn't muster a points finish until Hungary and ended the season 12th in the standings.

Whether Garcia's situation would be different had the experienced hands not returned is a question that can't be answered. But while having proven benchmarks is a good barometer of a driver's development, having the same drivers winning simply doesn't help those underneath looking to progress by showcasing their results.

Chadwick, Powell and Kimilainen won every race between them in 2021

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Part of the reason for W Series' existence is that women have often struggled for budget to move up the ladder and prove themselves.

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While W Series is a fully-funded series, F3 and F2 are not. Its harsh realities bit again this week, when Lirim Zendeli became the latest driver to see an F2 campaign curtailed by financial woes.

But many female drivers don't get that far. Abbi Pulling, one of the 2021 reserve drivers in W Series, was unable to continue her parallel season in British F4 after running out of cash. But her strong showings in W Series have provided a second chance to attract funding, with her performance in Austin particularly impressive.

The 18-year-old took pole in the first race, beating Chadwick to the top spot and only missing out on a podium to Powell on the final lap. Lining up behind Chadwick in race two, she held second to the flag and secured seventh in the standings on the basis of just four races.

If the wider motorsport community is to give more opportunities to women who have shone within its ranks, but are unable to fund their next step up the ladder, then work is also needed above where it sits to integrate W Series more into the feeder series pyramid

Former Formula 3 racer Sophia Floersch, who broke into sportscars last year with the all-female Richard Mille Racing LMP2 team funded by FIA Endurance Commission President Richard Mille, explained the nature of the issue to Autosport last year.

"It's no secret that motorsport is really expensive," she said. "If your parents don't have the money every single year to pay €1-2million, or partners or sponsors or people like Richard Mille believing in your story, that's where it gets more difficult for women because there is never a really performing woman in top motorsport ranks where sponsors see that women are actually able to do it.

"So sponsors are like, 'Yeah, but first you have to prove it', and you don't just have to prove it once, you have to prove it five times that you're actually as quick as the men. And it's like a circle, because you are not able to win a race if you don't have the same test days as the others. Even if you have testing bans in F3 or F2 or whatever, people can still find a way to go around those things. So I think that's the biggest issue, that women are not getting the same sponsorship deals."

Left on the sidelines after funding ended her British F4 campaign, Pulling's strong performance in Austin gave her an automatic place on next year's grid

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

But if drivers are going to struggle to make themselves financially competitive, even at F4 level, let alone graduating out of W Series higher up the ladder, then that's a problem that needs fixing – and it's a burden that can't be shouldered by W Series alone.

While CEO Catherine Bond Muir and her team have succeeded in providing a platform to showcase the best young female drivers and generate a buzz around women in racing, especially as part of the Formula 1 support package in 2021, W Series now must work out how to maintain its positive trajectory.

That upwards curve cannot be achieved in isolation. If the wider motorsport community is to give more opportunities to women who have shone within its ranks, but are unable to fund their next step up the ladder, then work is also needed above where it sits to integrate W Series more into the feeder series pyramid.

While 2021 Formula Regional champion Gregoire Saucy spent the first part of this week testing in F3 for ART Grand Prix, the same cannot be said for the top competitors in W Series.

In a show of some progress, W Series Academy drivers Nerea Marti and Sidorkova have been given a full day of F3 testing at Magny Cours next week, having finished fourth and ninth respectively in the standings. But it needs more than just test days, with a clear line of progression needed to spur on those hoping to enter W Series and demonstrate that it is possible to move upwards.

W Series is essentially a Formula Regional Championship with most licence holders excluded, which puts it on a similar footing to Formula Regional European by Alpine. Its position in F1 package and showing on TV doesn't mean it is one of the higher steps on the ladder, and that could be forgotten when looking for further steps up.

The true test of the series will be whether it succeeds in getting more girls into karting, and the next woman to make it into F1 as a driver will almost certainly have been inspired in some way by W Series. But the only way for that to happen is upwards movement.

Marti was the year's best rookie, finishing fourth. But no W Series driver featured in the end-of-season F3 tests

Photo by: Dom Romney / Motorsport Images

Boss Bruno Michel has previously spoken to Bond Muir about ways to get drivers from the series involved in F3, saying he has “had some discussions with Catherine to see how we can try to work together in the future”, adding that there are some “very interesting drivers in W Series.”

“I took the advantage of being with them in Austria, because we were really next door, to have some discussions with Catherine, the CEO of W Series, and to see how we can try to work together in the future,” he said. “Because there are some very interesting drivers in W Series.

“The thing is that the scale of age in W Series is much wider than it is for us in Formula 3, because that have drivers that go from 19 to 30, more or less, and Formula 3 is from 16 to 22, the average is 19 or 20 I would say.

“So the idea that we discussed is to use W Series drivers to try to get them into Formula 1, of course they have to come into the pyramid, and everybody is completely aware of that and everybody understands that.

“We are discussing the best way to do that, maybe to help get in some testing in Formula 3 for the winner. So there are discussions in the air, because it’s very important that they are coming into the pyramid and not just racing by themselves. Catherine is completely in agreement with that, so that’s something that we are discussing, absolutely.”

Those discussions need to come to fruition soon, because W Series deserves its place as part of the feeder series ladder, rather than alongside it – and it's up to motorsport as a whole to ensure that happens.

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Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images