Suzie Woolf Quits F1

[COD]

Desire Wilson won 3 F1 races in 1980 and 4 podiums in 1988. She is currently the most successfull F1 female driver to date.

She was a bit less successfull than you give her credit

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desiré_Wilson

[Nitrodaze]

Trying to make it into F1 via NASCAR or the IRL would be a complete waste of time, IMO. NASCAR is an (almost) all oval stock car series. So it really has no connection to Formula One. Other than some car swap promos/publicity stunts over the past decade or so, no NASCAR drivers have taken modern F1 cars for a run. Truly exceptional racers, like Jeff Gordon and Kyle Busch, have had their names mentioned in F1 circles. But NASCAR, in general, has not and will not be a path to Formula One. The old CART series had several drivers transition to F1, with varying degrees of success. But those cars were pretty much on par with F1 cars in regard to horsepower/weight. The (IRL) Indycar that we have now, while more developed than previous iterations of the series, still has a horsepower/weight ratio just above GP2. And to the best of my knowledge (fading memory issues here), no IRL driver has ever gotten a legit test. I believe Marco Andretti was given a "test" by Honda several years ago as a "thanks" to his dad's team. But he wasn't in line for a drive - neither was Danica. So that series isn't a gateway to F1 either. The old ChampCar series, sort of like CART's weak little brother, produced a dominant champion in Sebastien Bourdais. There should be no argument that the dude could race a car. But having a hotshoe youngster as his teammate, combined with having to deal with the intricacies of F1, did not serve him well.

I say all of this to point out that while a female can/could get into IRL Indycar with a check (Pippa Mann, Milka Duno, et al), by being popular and having sponsorship (Danica Patrick) or by having stick-to-it-tiveness and/or talent (Simona di Silvestro, Kathrine Legge and Sarah Fisher), most of us (I believe you included) wants Formula One to be the pinnacle of motorsports. Personally, I would like to see more racers making it on talent and fewer making it based on bringing sponsorship or any sort of politics (political correctness included). If a female dominates in the IRL, that might get her a test in F1. I don't know. But I would say that winning a handful of races in GP2 and being in the top three in the standings would get the attention of an F1 team even more. There is simply no substitute for having a leg up by knowing many of the tracks and understanding the engineering culture in F1.

My idea... while Susie is tool old and doesn't have the talent to race in Formula One, she has been around the game long enough to be helpful to someone who is younger and does have the raw talent to some day race in Formula One. She has written for Huffington Post. And though Arianna Huffington no longer owns that site outright, she's still connected to it... and she has a boatload of money. The two of them could combine forces and foster a girl who actually could climb the ladder to F1. They could. The question is, do they want to do something real or just talk the talk, while refusing to walk the walk? Time will tell.

Jag, it is always great to read your posts and you speak wisely. I have to say that l agree with you completely that we want F1 to be the pinnacle of motorsport. And it should not be watered down for any reason. Having fewer cars on the grid has alot to do with the difficult and highly competitive path into this modern day F1. I talk about women drivers with the full knowledge that there are a host of very talented drivers out there deserving of a shot at driving a F1 car but are unable to find a drive. Throwing the plight of women drivers into this mix, especially since there is a lean supply of equivalent level of women drivers is admittedly reaching. It would be great to see a competent female driver in a F1 car in the near future. Maybe Silvestro would get another chance via another team.

[Jag_Warrior]

Thank you, Nitro. I appreciate that. And yes, Simona is someone who I've also liked for awhile. I like her attitude and I like her approach. I don't know her personally, but I don't believe there's a single thing about her that says, "entitlement". She's even said that she doesn't want to be seen (strictly) as a "female driver". I think that's smart on her part, because currently, that's like being in a tallest midget contest. And unlike Susie and Carmen, she didn't sit around and wait for too long before finding another ride and getting back in the cockpit. Unless (and even if) you're a GP2 champ, you can't stay on the sidelines for too long. My feeling is that both Susie and Carmen have avoided racing of late in order to keep people from seeing just how mediocre (at best) they are. Both have connections and/or access to money. And both could have been racing throughout this season... if they'd wanted to.

As I believe someone said earlier in this thread, the girls who are on the go-kart or lower formula tracks now are the ones who *may* make it to Formula One. Other than Simona, I can't think of a female who has recently won even a lower formula series race. And I think it does a disservice to all females when people cannot be honest (because it's a political correctness no-no to state the truth) and tell people like Susie Wolff or Carmen Jorda that they just don't have what it takes, and they're never going to be in an F1 car and actually race... unless someone is willing to write a huge check and put them in a backmarker car.

I'm never going to be the CEO of Bank of America. I came to that conclusion a long time ago. But rather than whine about it or hang around the BofA lobby, bothering the board members as they walked by, I took my career in another direction. There's nothing wrong with dreaming. But at some point, you have to get in tune with reality.