F1 broadcaster Lee McKenzie supports girls in motorsport campaign

Lee McKenzie hosted a Q&A session as part of the #GirlsWill campaign

Isabella Verona/ BBC Lee McKenzie is smiling at the camera in front of a framed photograph of the racing track. She has brown hair and is wearing a leopard print jumper with a poppy badge for Remembrance Day. — Lee McKenzie hosted a Q&A session as part of the #GirlsWill campaign

A sports broadcaster said a campaign to increase female participation in motorsport was “hugely important”.

Lee McKenzie, a Formula 1 presenter, spoke at the Silverstone Museum as the Northamptonshire circuit launched the second year of its #GirlsWill campaign.

The scheme was established to encourage girls to follow careers in motorsport and science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

McKenzie said: “There is a huge drop out across all sports for girls around 14 years old, not just in motorsport.”

She said: “That is being looked at and it will change. It needs to change. Not just in motorsport, it needs to change across the board.”

A 2023 study by More Than Equal, an organisation that was co-founded by the ex-Formula 1 driver, David Coulthard, found female participation in motorsport worldwide was about 10%.

‘I didn’t know any different’

McKenzie spoke at the Silverstone Museum as part of an event to promote her new book called Inside F1: Life Alongside Legends, and she discussed her career in sports broadcasting which she began aged 15.

She said: “I was reporting on a rugby match on a Saturday and getting the Monday morning off school to write up these articles. Nobody told me I couldn’t do it.”

McKenzie said she had “always felt incredibly welcome” in the industry and was unaware of how male dominated it was because grew up alongside it.

“I didn’t know any different,” she said.

McKenzie said there were many role models for female drivers, but added that their exposure to a wider audience was a challenge.

“Women are racing,” she said. “Just not in the place that people want them to be racing.”

Silverstone is the home of F1’s British Grand Prix

EPA Lewis Hamilton driving on Silverstone Circuit race track with rows and rows of fans dotted behind him. — Silverstone is the home of F1’s British Grand Prix

As part of the campaign, the Silverstone Museum offered free admission to its #GirlsWill events which took place in October.

Stephanie Sykes-Dugmore, the head of collections and research at the Silverstone Museum, said: “We are using this campaign as an opportunity to extend the message that girls can start entering motorsport. We are trying to change that.

“The fact that so many girls are turning up to these events just shows how much the F1 audience is diversifying”, Ms Sykes-Dugmore added.

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