Catherine Bond Muir may not seem the obvious candidate to have founded the world’s first all-female single-seater motor racing championship. A former intellectual property solicitor, in 2000 she moved into corporate finance and spent more than a decade working on sports and gaming deals. This included the sale of Chelsea FC to Roman Abramovich. After a career break following the birth of her first and only child relatively late in life, she was ready for a new challenge.

W Series was born at Catherine’s dining table. As a lifelong motorsport fan with treasured childhood memories of watching James Hunt racing on the television, she saw that, while women’s sport was generally enjoying a boom in popularity, the situation was only getting worse for women in motorsport. It has now been 46 years since a woman competed in a Championship Formula 1 Grand Prix, and it is W Series’ mission to change this.

W Series is a free-to-enter championship that provides equal opportunities for women and eliminates the financial barriers that have historically prevented them from progressing to the upper echelons of motorsport. By placing all participants in identical cars, the series ensures that talent takes precedence. Since its inaugural season in 2019, W Series has created the greatest number of professional women racing drivers of all time. In 2021, W Series entered a new landmark partnership with Formula 1 and supported the world’s premier motor racing series at seven Grand Prix weekends.