W Series Returns for Season Three

After the highly anticipated return of the 2021 season, W Series is back for season three. Last year saw Alice Powell start strong, achieving her maiden pole position during round-one in Austria.

She took wins at the Red Bull Ring, Silverstone, and Zandvoort but the 28-year-old was pipped to the title by fellow Brit Jamie Chadwick. Chadwick was crowned the champion for the second time in her W Series career after the season finale at the Circuit of the Americas.

Credit: W Series

The sport announced an exciting partnership deal last year, where it will race at eight FIA Formula 1 World Championship weekends during its upcoming season. 2022 will see the series return to Silverstone, the Hungaroring and the Circuit of the Americas.

The 2021 Silverstone race saw 18-year-old Brit Abbi Pulling make her W series debut and the 2021 Hungaroring witnessed Nerea Martí finishing on the podium for the first time in her W Series career. To add the list of tracks raced alongside Formula 1 Grand Prix weekends, the all-female drivers will take to the stage in Miami, Spain, France, Japan and Mexico for the first time.

2022 Confirmed Drivers

As well as five new circuits, W Series sees five new drivers: Tereza Babickov, Bianca Bustamante, Chloe Chambers, Emely De Heus and Juju Noda. The championship has recently announced its all-female 2022 driver line-up.

Credit: W Series

The top eight qualifying drivers from 2021 automatically secured a seat. Jamie Chadwick, Alice Powell, Emma Kimilainen, Nerea Martí, Sarah Moore, Fabienne Wohlwend, Abbi Pulling and Beitske Visser will race alongside nine women who were selected from pre-season tests in Spain and the USA.

These remaining drivers competed at Inde Motorsports Ranch in Arizona and the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in Barcelona where W Series Race Director Dave Ryan and his team assessed who would fill the available seats.

The nine drivers selected to race alongside last season’s top eight are:

Tereza Babickova, 18Bianca Bustamante, 17Chloe Chambers, 17Emely De Heus, 19Belén García, 22Marta Garcia, 21Jessica Hawkins, 27Juju Noda, 16Bruna Tomaselli, 24

The championship aims to encourage and create opportunities for as many women in motorsport as possible. To do this, W Series is leaving the final seat open to its reserve drivers who have demonstrated promising results in previous seasons and testing’s.

2022 Teams

2022 will see new teams in new colours. The first team to be announced for the season was Jenner Racing. Founded by Olympic athlete Caitlyn Jenner, the team aims to “raise awareness of equal rights whilst promoting the many talented females competing in the male-dominated world of motorsports”.

Credits: W Series Media

Joining Jenner Racing is Click2Drive Bristol Street Motors and cryptocurrency-backed teams, CortDAO (Community Owned Racing Team Decentralized Autonomous Organization) and Quantfury. New entrant W Series Academy is the only team yet to be launched. teams returning to the grid are PUMA, Racing X, Siring Racing and Scuderia W.

Hankook will continue in 2022 as the Series’ official tyre partnership, alongside the teams’ identical Tatuus-Alfa Romeo F3 T-318 race cars.