F1 Academy, Managing Director, Susie Wolff. Picture: The Citizen/Faizel Patel
F1 Academy, managing director, Susie Wolff has inspired women to aim for great heights in whatever profession they choose, including motorsport.
Wolff, the wife of Mercedes AMG F1 team principle Toto Wolff was speaking during the Momentum “She owns her success” gathering in Sandton on Wednesday.
She had a wide-ranging discussion with guests and journalists, touching on topics of being at the helm of her profession, balancing her career with being a wife and mother, keeping healthy and also doing everything she can to empower and help others achieve success.
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Wolff who had an inspiring, competitive and successful motorsport career spanning over 20 years, scored points for women at the 2014 British Grand Prix by becoming the first woman to take part in a Formula 1 race weekend in 22 years.
While there aren’t women currently on the F1 starting grid, Wolff said the world is changing.
“I think where we were five or six years ago, we can be thankful for the next generation, because I supersede my industry, the world is changing, society is changing, we have a place at the table.”
Wolff stressed that sometimes it’s important to listen.
“Listen to what other people are doing and what they have achieved,” she explained.
Wolff said being in F1 is more than just driving around the track at phenomenal speeds to win the Grand Prix.
“On a Grand Prix weekend, there’s only 20 drivers on the grid. But there are tens of thousands of people involved in making the event happen and getting the cars on the grid for all teams.
“I’ve always said at the F1 Academy, we don’t exist just to find the next female Formula 1 driver. That would be way too narrow. We exist to open up the whole sport, make it more accessible.
“Accessibility is not an easy one because unlike football where you just need a pair of boots and a ball, in F1 there is a financial barrier and unfortunately its very high and that’s one of the challenges,” Wolff said.
Wolff said the struggle to the top is a long, hard road, but women must have the tenacity and drive to want to succeed.
She spoke about how she used work as race marshal at the track and also in the shop selling racing equipment so that she could have money to pursue her racing career.
Wolff has praised the warmth of the South African people.
“There’ll be times in life where we thought of it within our control, but we have to put ourselves in the best position to have success and then secondly, the energy here in South Africa, the enthusiasm, the passion, I can’t help but also be inspired by meeting so many great people and have such a warm welcome.”
Wolff began her competitive motorsport career over 20 years ago, starting out as so many of her racing contemporaries did, on the karting track. After cutting her teeth in karting, she went on to Formula Renault and DTM for Mercedes-Benz and finally Formula 1.
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