There's been a few test and reserve drivers over the years. But ultimately there hasn't been a good enough F2 or F3 driver to promote to F1. Need more talent to come through the ranks which is something they did with Formula W and they are trying to do now with F1 Academy. It just takes time to find the right talents since there are so few girls starting with go carts in the first place.
Discussion
interesting. how many women drivers have there been in f2 and f3 over the years? feels like women are being told they are not good enough through the actions of series and teams, rather than it being necessarily true. the sport should make more of an effort. I have mixed feelings about f1 academy tbh
Well through Formula W and F1 Academy they are making a much bigger effort than any other time in the past since these series are exclusive to female drivers... The best drivers should be advancing to F3 and then F2, so maybe a bit more patience...
The only driver to drive for F2 was Calderon and she had a test driving role in F1, but unfortunately that was without merit, she was the only driver not to score a single point in F2. So in a way being a female was beneficial to her at the time. Eventually those are performance based sports so the best performing drivers get F1 drives. Hopefully there is a new crop of female talent coming up soon.
Or maybe Motorsport has to be treated as any other sport and separate genders? Not sure, since driving formula cars is very physical requiring massive amounts of strength and stamina...