Abbi Pulling laid down the gauntlet in the 2024 F1 Academy season to win the championship by a dominant margin over early-season favorite Doriane Pin. This also secured her seat in the GB3 championship for 2025. However, the 21-year-old might have had to halt her career had she lost the F1 Academy title this year — all due to a tight financial situation.
Speaking with F1’s Lawrence Barretto in a recent chat for F1 Academy’s YouTube channel, Pulling shed light on her financial troubles. The Briton recalled how she had to stop racing for a brief period in 2021 due to the lack of money to fund her career. Heading into 2024, she admitted that she had a lot of “pressure” to perform and win the title.
“If I finished P2, I don’t know what I’d been doing. I could have potentially been stopping, I’d like to think not. But it’s the harsh reality of the sport and this is what we live in,” Pulling said.
9th win for Abbi Pulling in Race 2!
Another dominant performance from the Series Champion at Yas Marina!#F1Academy #AbuDhabiGP pic.twitter.com/1jXSuHcMJz
— F1 Academy (@f1academy) December 7, 2024
Pulling was absolutely correct about the harsh situation of financial backing that all drivers in motorsports face. Even male racers struggle to find sponsors to keep their careers afloat in the junior formulas. They cannot survive with proper sponsorship backing, as it is quite expensive to get a seat in F3 or F2 besides the general expenditure.
Naturally, female racers struggle even more, with racing still unfairly balanced in favor of men. The likes of Pulling and Pin (who finished second), who aspire to pursue motorsport, will face a steep climb up the motorsport ladder, which can hinder their progress to F3 or F2, let alone F1.
Can F1 Academy change the status quo for female racers?
F1 Academy’s predecessor—the W-Series which is not defunct—was serving its purpose of providing a development platform for female racers. However, their overall financial liquidity led to an unsustainable model and the series ceased to exist in mid-2022.
However, it did lead to their champion, Jamie Chadwick, developing into a solid driver and securing a seat in the IndyNXT series with Andretti Autosport. F1 Academy is working to continue this legacy of grooming female racers to compete at the top level of motorsport.
Under Susie Wolff’s leadership, they have also onboarded all 10 F1 teams to back one driver each and help them develop their skills while competing in the F1 Academy championship.
The visibility on the wider F1 platform will certainly help female racers gain more popularity and it can groom them to deal with the on and off-track pressure of a truly global championship. From a financial and sporting support perspective as well, F1 teams must be doing their part towards the F1 Academy drivers.
