Fighting for the W

This year’s W Series will end with a two-race battle between a pair of ambitious Brits tied on points. Damien Smith asks how they’re feeling as they head to Texas

- Damien Smith

Britain’s best-known female racers will go head to head this weekend to decide who will be the 2021 W Series champion. Jamie Chadwick and Alice Powell will travel to the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, for a double-header on the US Grand Prix support bill. They’re dead level on points at the top of the standings in the tussle for a prize of $500,000 (£367,000), 15 F1 superlicence points and the kudos of an increasingly prestigious title.

Mathematically, Emma Kimiläinen – the only driver other than Chadwick and Powell to have won a race this year – can also still be champion. But the Finn is 34 points behind and so, with 50 on offer this weekend, needs both Brits to do her a massive favour to stand any chance. Realistically, either Chadwick will retain the title that she won during the inaugural W Series season in 2019 or it will be Powell, who finished third last time and hasn’t won a motor racing championship since she claimed the Formula Renault Asia Cup in 2014.

Autocar spoke to both drivers to find out how they’re feeling ahead of the big finale, what the title would mean to them and what might come next.

ALICE POWELL

Powell, a 28-year-old from Chipping Norton, counts herself lucky to be racing at all, never mind fighting for a title in a Formula 1 support series that benefits from live TV coverage in the UK (courtesy of Channel 4). She made it as far as GP3 (now FIA Formula 3) before the money ran out and fell back on building work for her dad. Remarkably, she still dons a hard hat every now and then.