Citroen and Benefit chose Silverstone as the venue to launch the third DS3 by Benefit special edition. The all-female press pack were given the chance to experience thrill rides with female racing drivers. I think they got makeovers, too, they don’t often get offered at Silverstone.
   I managed to grab 25-year-old racer Annalese Ferrari from Leicestershire, who has raced in the Leon Cup, Green Touring Car League, and various carting championships. I asked:

Do you think a woman will get to drive in F1 in the next 5 years? She said:

“ I do think it’s possible because Sauber has just signed Simona de Silvestro and there’s a lot of talk that she will get offered a seat next year because she’s  one of the best that has a chance at doing that.
   And there’s Susie Wolf at Williams but I’m not sure she’ll get a seat because she’s not got the extensive record as Simona."

So what would help?
“A strong female role model would help more females get into F1 and would take it into a more mainstream space. Generally, people think that women in F1 is all about the grid girls!”

Murray Walker opened an exhibition at the National Motor Museum, celebrating 70 years of the Guild of Motoring Writers, following our AGM on 8 May.
   After lunch we were treated to a very amusing talk by Richard Noble about his Bloodhound project, and got to try out an assortment of Lexus and Toyota cars.
    We also had a guided tour of the museum and its archives. All in all a good day out, and the most surprising thing for me, was how many women were hiding in the exhibits, the photos and the stories we heard about motoring history.
Read more

I was recently sent some fascinating information about the racing driver Anne-Cecile Itier.

On this blog, I’d admired the gorgeous T51/38 Bugatti Roadster, known as the Mystery Roadster, because no one knows who put this body on it. Its Danish owner Henrik-Schou Nielsen sent me some photos of the car and this replica racing licence produced for Goodwood.

The car was built for Mme Itier as a Type 51A, around a 1926 Type 35. Factory test sheets state that its new twin-cam engine produced up to 140bhp at 5500rpm – putting it among the most powerful Bugatti GP racers of the time. She owned the car from 1933 to 37, and raced it in all types of events, even racing against a plane at Montlhery in 1936.

What a gal!

If you have any more information about the Mystery Roadster, get in touch via my contact form.

Zoë Davies’ mum loves Made in Dagenham, the film about women winning recognition and equal pay at Ford’s Dagenham plant in the 1968. Apparently she finds it hard to imagine how different the work and conditions are at Ford’s Bridgend Engine plant, where Zoe has worked for 14 years.
   It’s a world away from the Metropolis-style image words such as ‘factory’ and ‘industrial’ conjure up, even now, to those who haven’t worked in one recently.
   Bridgend isn’t a new plant, but it’s super-clean – you even have to walk across a sticky pad and wear clean gloves to work in the turbo section. Noise is muted; engine blocks glide along a conveyor belts past efficient robots or technicians according to the task.
   Once complete, they will head to Ford plants all over the world, including the USA and Asia. The computers know exactly which engine is going where, and make sure each one has the right parts for the weather conditions and local emissions regulations.
    Some 2,300 people work at Bridgend in three shifts. Zoë is one of the mega-loom assembly team (wire harness). There are 11 on the team, (just two are women) and they swap jobs throughout the day to avoid boredom. “It’s like a family,” she says.
   All week she’s helping to show journalists around the plant. She often gets roped in when visitors come because she speaks fluent Welsh and can translate if necessary. We’ll be driving the new Fiesta ST once we’re finished here. She’s had a go and her face lights up as she says, “It’s really fast, much faster than my Titanium.”
   The plant already makes the 1.6-litre Ecoboost engine, introduced in 2011, but while we’re here, we’re given some good news. A new 1.5-litre version comes online soon, meaning 500 more jobs.
   It’s likely a number of them will be women, too. Zoë says when she started, there were very few, but a lot more have joined the workforce over the past couple of years. There hasn’t been a particular drive by the company, but she wonders if women are realising that factories have changed, and can be a rewarding place to work.