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The W Series Hasn't Paid Drivers' Prize Money: Report
The women's-only championship has also apparently gone bust
By
Ryan Erik King
PublishedYesterday
Comments (4)
Jamie Chadwick holding the W Series Championship Trophy in 2019

What is a championship trophy worth without any prize money?
Photo: Dan Istitene (Getty Images)
A racing driver’s road to Formula 1 is rough and costly. Nearly every
driver on the junior ladder has to pay their teams to compete, and the
vast majority of drivers are also male. W Series aimed to flip the
script by recruiting a field of drivers to compete in a fully-funded championship for a $1.5 million prize purse. However, the women’s-only
series ran into financial difficulties which cut its 2022 season short
and led to the organization’s bankruptcy early this month. Now, several drivers have stated that they haven’t received any prize money for last season.

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Alice Powell and Abbi Pulling confirmed to TopGear.com that they didn’t receive any prize money for their results in the 2022 season. Powell is
owed $125,000 for her third-place finish in the championship. Pulling is
owed $100,000 after she secured fourth in the standings. TopGear.com
also reports that Jamie Chadwick hasn’t been paid $500,000 for winning
her third consecutive W Series championship. Other drivers have been
hesitant to speak out worrying that it would damage their future career prospects in motorsports.

W Series entered administration in the United Kingdom earlier this
month, an insolvency procedure similar to bankruptcy in the United
States. There is a search underway to find a prospective buyer to
salvage the unique competition. The sale proceeds would then be used to
pay creditors, presumably including the drivers. Again, that would only
happen if a buyer is found and it’s decided to pay out prize money.

Image for article titled The W Series Hasn't Paid Drivers' Prize
Money: Report
Photo: Dan Istitene (Getty Images)
While the prospect of W Series being revived is appealing to its
dedicated core of fans, the competition is flawed as a commercial
product. The competition aimed to capitalize on the swell of new young
F1 fans and investment into women’s sports while somehow overcoming the obvious shortfalls of its position in the racing landscape.

W Series was openly a developmental series. It was positioned to develop
and advance female drivers up the ladder to Formula 1. It also needed to
be an attractive product from television broadcasters and corporate
sponsors, but the drivers are the most marketable aspect of any racing
series. How was W Series supposed to be financially sustainable while
hoping its best talent moved on toward F1 as quickly as possible?

The demise of W Series isn’t surprising, but it’s definitely
disappointing. Formula 1 has created F1 Academy to fill the void, but it
was originally intended to serve as a cost-controlled feeder category
for W Series. Driver development isn’t financially self-sustaining, and
the demographic makeup of the drivers who make it to F1 won’t change
unless vested interests at the top want to spend the money to change it.


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