OFFICIAL PROGRAMME
It is difficult to imagine a more ‘ male ’ environment than motorcycle racing . Arguably the last great gladiatorial sport , bike racing had been fuelled and occasionally failed by an over reliance on testosterone off track as well as on track for decades . But something is changing , shifting , progressing . When the idea of writing this story was first mooted the initial plan was to canvass opinion from as many women in the paddock as possible . It became rapidly evident that this list was going to be too long attempt even a short comment from everyone . There are quite a number of women working in WorldSBK in 2021 . That simple realisation , more than any other form of statistical data analysis , has been the result of a gradual but continuing trend . It would have been a much shorter list 20 years ago . Way shorter . The vast , vast majority of people working in WorldSBK or any other motorsport are still men but even in the 20-odd years since I have been working there has seen a subtle but clearly real shift in roles and simple numbers of paddock women . There was no artificial ‘ positive discrimination ’ agenda over those 20-odd years , it has happened it seems because more women have started working here , enjoyed working here , and continued working here .
We are a long way from any kind of tipping point in relative numbers of men and women but almost wherever you look you can find women filling new roles , carving their own path . In any form of human endeavour in what we could call the western world , where one woman breaks a real or imagined barrier others will surely follow . Maybe , just maybe , motorcycle racing from participant to trackside spectators will remain a majority male scene for all time . Few people , however , see any kind of future that does not include more and more women choosing bike racing as a career path with prospects . Easing the career paths , demonstrating what is possible for women in this sport , is also seen as something for the powers that be to get behind . In a timely fashion for this story the FIM has very recently appointed Pippa Laverty to encourage and support more racing women in her new role as the newest member of the FIM Women In Motorcycling Commission . A truly multitasking entity , Pippa was once a grid girl - a brolly dolly as the Un-PC brigade would still say - which may seem strange when some PC people hate the very idea of having women objectified in motorsports in that particular role . But here she is , married to Eugene Laverty of course , but a businesswoman in her past and now the focal point , figurehead and heart of aspirant women in WorldSBK in her very own right . So what exactly is her new
57