Chadwick hoping for Hypercar future after laps of Le Mans
FILE PHOTO: The 24 Hours of Le Mans - Circuit de la Sarthe, Le Mans, France - June 14, 2025 General view of the start of the 24 Hours of Le Mans REUTERS/Stephane Mahe/File Photo
June 9 : Jamie Chadwick knows where she wants to be and what she wants to do after becoming the first woman driver to lap the 24 Hours of Le Mans' Circuit de la Sarthe in a Hypercar.
The three-time winner of the now-defunct all-female W Series is reserve for Hyundai's Genesis Magma team debuting in the top class at the pinnacle of endurance racing.
"Driving the Mulsanne Straight for the first time (in a Hypercar), these are the kind of things any racing driver dreams of," the 28-year-old Briton told Reuters on Tuesday.
"It's definitely made me more hungry to be in Hypercar at some point and transition from this role into a full time race driver seat."
Chadwick needed the handful of laps on Sunday to feel at home in the car in case she needs to step in as a late replacement for next Saturday's start of what is the jewel in the crown of the World Endurance Championship.
Chadwick competed last year in the second-tier LMP2 category and, after racing single seaters in North America and talking earlier in her career about Formula One, sees sportscar racing as where her future lies.
"It definitely feels like where I want to find a home, where I want to find my career," said the Briton, who also works as an occasional Formula One pundit for Sky Sports television.
"And that is being a full-time Hypercar driver."
Only two women are racing at Le Mans this year, both of them French, compared with five in June last year.
F1 Academy champion Doriane Pin is competing in LMP2 with the number 30 Duqueine Oreca while Lilou Wadoux is in the GT3 class in a Richard Mille AF Corse Ferrari.
Pin, the first woman to drive a Mercedes Formula One car, is on Peugeot's driver roster and also hoping for an eventual Hypercar chance.
"This year I will focus on the development of the car but hopefully I will have an opportunity in the near future to become an official driver in the top category of endurance," she said recently.
"I want to race against the best in the world and hopefully it will be with them (Peugeot) and competing in the WEC and the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the best category."
Wadoux drove Toyota's title-winning Hypercar in a 2022 post-season rookie test in Bahrain, the first woman in a top class prototype since Belgian Vanina Ickx raced an LMP1 Lola-Aston Martin at Le Mans in 2011.
