In today’s video I discuss the failings of the W Series and F1 Academy as all-female junior series intended to help women progress further up the racing ladder. I lambast everything from logistics to the concept of the racing itself.
There’s no rule keeping women out of F1. It should go for any racing driver really if you’re good enough you’ll make it, if you’re not good enough, too bad. No reason to place women in a separate category because there will never be a women’s F1 and a men’s F1.
I will say that in the past 5 years I have seen more and more young girls at the local karting track which is awesome. Saying that, all drivers need time to develop skill and race craft and it will take time for these young women to make their way up the ladder. F1 Acadamy seems to be trying to get a woman into F1 ASAP without letting them fully develop their talent.
Couldn’t agree more. W series was rubbish and F1 academy is just for optics. The women over here who are involved with Indy car were appalled when it first came out. Shits dumb as hell. We know there have been plenty of talented women who never needed any all female category. But I also don’t blame the girls for participating. It would make more sense too if the FIA sponsored the champ with a good F3 seat to at least give a chance to continue to move up the rungs. The whole thing is broken and they should reallocate those funds just as you’ve said. Trying to drum up interest at a lower level and drawing more girls in if that’s what they really want.
1 F1 Academy is project of FOM not FIA 2 Problems with broadcast and not racing on F1 weekends will be fixed in 2024 3 F1 Academy made some program also for girls to help them in karting 4 The F1 Academy chapion got seat in FRECA Top-team (sice F1 Academy is F4 level championchip it is what most drivers do after F4) and it is fully funded so she gets all the support, but they cannost support everyone, so this helps them to tell who has biggest potencial to do it with support), and now she can show if she is fast enough and if she is progress will come
I do think f1 Academy should exist but for it work there needs to more support for women in other series’s. I think there needs to be an all women’s team in f2,f3 and Freca. With f1 academy as a f4 safety net for women drivers who may not get seats in other f4 championship. But the fia needs to do fund women in karting as well. I think the fia at this time are doing the bare minimum required to improve the chances for women in Motorsport. Iron Dames has proved that an all female team can work and can get fantastic results.
I think W series had a lot of potential. It had a youtube channel, broadcasts more exposure. But no reliatible teams unfortunately. F1 academy flies so much under the radar that no one really knows about it. W series as a concept had more strenghts but F1 management did not go all in really. If all f1 teams had their teams with all women line up then only from brand following and recognition it would've gained extra audience. Essentially junior program championship for women. Maybe if covid never happened W series would still be around.
Michele Mouton, has straight up no female rivals, she would wipe the floor with any female driver in history. She would in her peak wipe the floor with Jamie Chadwick and anyone in F1 academy. She is pretty much the only female driver ever known whom has a genuine chance in being effective in modern F1. Hence I dare say swap the current F1 academy cars with 2005 F1 regulation cars except turn up the power and use modern slicks. Stream that to RU-vid and run it for 15 years there are going to be a lot of crashes but I have a sneaking feeling. It will generate one or more female drivers that actually have a decent chance. But I can say the viewership will be decent since half the grid will crash for the first few seasons. Most of F1 academy are F4 drop outs so I dare say a v10 F1 academy would separate the wheat from the chaff.
Completely agreed. I cannot understand how people still think that women are not in F1 because they are discriminated, and I also do not know why many people feel the need to see women in F1. Not to discriminate, but Formula 1 won't prove to be "more inclusive and open-minded" if some team hires a woman. Also, one advice for the next video: the Ensign Racing Team has a pretty long and cool story and it would be cool to listen to along with the Theodore Racing.
Those videos will come out in January as the recording studio I use has shut down for Christmas break. They will be first on my list, also Theodore is mentioned in one of my other uploads that I’ll be releasing soon
F1 Academy WILL be broadcast live starting 2024, and now that F1 teams will have liveries in the series as well, there is also a level of relatability to new viewers of the series. I 100% agree that addressing the lack of women in the sport comes down to the grassroots level, and that's certainly something the FIA should be working towards, but I feel that by no means is the concept of F1A awful. Someone else commented "F1 Academy is just for optics" but like... that's sort of the point. You can make as many karting academies and support as you want but if no girls want to race, then they won't, and more girls will want to race if they see women racing on TV! I have no idea why you neglect this point, and I would've agreed with you if it wasn't for the fact that F1A is actually going to be broadcasted starting 2024 and that it's plastered all over their instagram. As a man it's easy to oversee the entire "inspiration" aspect of things because in a lot of sports, men are at the top (regardless of whether there is a physical sex advantage), so this is not something we have to consider and it seems like you missed that entirely in this video as well. Grassroots support is important but so is a top-down approach!
I will say this... I watched the two F1 Academy races in Singapore this year and I seriously don't understand why it's even a series in the first place. They are driving F4 spec, there is literally no overtaking and they do ~15 laps per race, which is basically a sprint race. It's an absolute joke if we're being honest. Not to mention that the most competitive drivers in F1 Academy are older than most F3 drivers, which is basically a series for "toddlers" to get into F2/F1.
Some teams albeit silently also think this. Look at ferrari their best female driver in their academy is not even in the f1 academy andfor a rookie had a very repectable season in FRE.
That video has a two errors I'd like to highlight: - F1 Academy starting 2024 season is racing the same weekends as F1, even in 2023 they were racing alongside United States Grand Prix - W Series isn't using seperate chassis. Tatuus T-318 they were racing in is used also in most of Formula Regional series including Formula Regional Middle East and Formula Regional European Also that video is more of a rant about W Series (may it rest in peace). F1 Academy fixed some issues of W Series, but also created a few other. Exposure became kinda a double-edged sword, when drivers like Doriane Pin or Maya Weug, who has proved as competent drivers higher on the racing ladder stepping back to F1 academy.
I follow F1 and i don't pay attention to the feeder racing like F3 or F2 as it is not aired in Canada. I saw some W Series but it was domination even though it is a spec series. People say the fix to F1 is go to spec airo packages for all teams. This will not enhance competition. The goal is to get Females into F1 and it has shown nothing bas Suzie Wolf testing a Williams.
@nedzosf1gridbox so I am from Green Bay Wisconsin, and when she was dating Aaron Rodgers she went to a gym one of my employees trained at, to say people disliked her is an understatement!
F1 Academy like W Series (championship) will fail due to the lack of MONEY!!! $$$ $$$ doesn't matter how good you are driving these little F4 cars around. lol
Two things. W Series cars were comparable to cars used in mixed series - it was Formula Regional, like FRECA, F3 Asian, etc. but being centrally run on slower Hankook tyres made them look way slower than men. The other thing. the series wasn't created by FIA, it was F1 itself; FIA puts no money in F1 Academy nor they invited the champion to their prize giving gala.
F1 academy would be better if it guaranteed half the seats were female rather than all female. Give female drivers the chance to compete against males on equal terms but if you completely separate them you have no baseline to compare them to.
This fucking guy: There's not enough grass roots support for women in racing! F1 Academy: ok, here is a female feeder series with drivers from many different cultures. TFG: No, not like that.
correct me if I'm wrong but I will say the only reason it wasn't streamed live was contract issues with w series i think. it will be live in 2024 im pretty sure other then that i agree with most of your points
It's slightly disingenuous to say that no driver from W Series progressed to an F1 team and that all competitors abandoned European racing series. Jamie Chadwick became a development driver for Williams before going to Indy NXT, Marta Garcia will be in Formula E in 2024, Jess Hawkins is only involved as a meet-and-greet for Aston but it's closer than many drivers get to F1. The main thing stopping female drivers from entering F1 now is sponsorship money and if F1 Academy helps with this then I'm fully in favour of it.
Jamie Chadwick has only one podium in Indy NXT in an Andretti. She finished behind all her teammates last year and is behind two of three this year. Andretti is top tier machinery, similar to pre-2024 PREMA in European circles. I’m excited to see what Garcia can do outside of F1 Academy and there’s not enough data to fully quantify Jess Hawkins, I don’t know enough to praise or criticise her but that’s on me. Hope you understand why the current crop of drivers is a bit mid
@@nedzosf1gridbox They can be good with the right discipline and training. I have seen women on the job that are Butch and manly and strong they can do almost any other job. If they want to go to F1 they should race against male counterparts. In the future there could be a female or someone LGBTQ or even Non Binary
@antonysnook4932 I think LGBTQ+ pushes onto more sensitive ground became for example F1 races in countries where being gay is illegal. I’m bisexual myself and I know I wouldn’t ever race in those countries, one for fear of my safety from prosecution or from the public reaction, and two I don’t wanna help prop up an event for a country that thinks I shouldn’t exist. It’s like when james hunt boycotted the South African race in the early 80s as a commentator because he hated apartheid. It’ll take for a trailblazer, there was a gay driver in the 70s but he ended up dying of AIDS. Any openly gay driver would face the same hurdles a woman would, people saying they’re only there to meet quotas, or they’d just be used as a political piece of meat by both sides. Motorsport is very inclusive but the places where we race aren’t
Unfortunately, the days of meritocracy and rewards for those who work hard are long gone. F1 Academy is another example of just that, a half baked attempt by the higher-ups to appease the vocal minority whilst ignoring the bigger picture and not prioritising what it needs to, thus suffering as a result.
I think it's up to a sport to attract viewers; there is never any obligation of anyone to bother viewing any sport at all. Personally speaking, I have enough to do to fill my time and I am not looking for more. In fact, I'd love to see F1 ditch sprint races, so F1 lessens its claims on my time. I think it is as important for women drivers to drive in Saudi Arabia as it was for Owens to show to the Germans who was the fastest human in 1936. Personally, I find it sexist that there is a special league for women. Or that women need to be pushed at all. Genitals should not matter. We are talking about a sport. Humans need physical exercise for their health. Top sport is pushing the body beyond the boundaries farther than anyone else and it not the pinnacle for health. It is entertainment. No entertainer has a right to a public. If a W-series cannot exist on its own merits and pushed by itself, it should not exist.
Yeah so let’s maybe be positive towards the advancement of women in motorsport!! Just because no rule separates the gender categories, doesn’t mean that women haven’t been excluded. 5 women have been officially drivers for over 70 years. It isn’t because they aren’t strong enough or fast enough, it’s because they aren’t given the opportunity because for over 70 YEARS the men have taken up all of the space. Much love❤️
F1 is crap nowadays, never mind the academy. There's no characters anymore. The tyres have taken over strategy. It sounds shit. There's no beautiful V10 wail. All the great years of it have already been. Years 1990 -2010 are great. After that it became bollocks.
