About Katia

Growing up, F1 was always on the TV. It felt like there was always some form of car racing going on and as a young child the speed, the colours, and sounds, drew me in. I grew up listening to stories about Michael Schumacher’s dominance in Ferrari and as a youngster, I was sure that he was some kind of superhuman.

My dad’s passion was and still is classic cars and I soon became a child enthusiast. Learning about the engines, the smell of petrol, the feeling of the seats and the huge steering wheel, really appealed to me and I loved everything about it.

Growing up, watching Sebastian Vettel dominating in Red Bull was my first proper memory of watching Formula 1. I loved the way the Red Bull car looked and would always root for Vettel’s car to win, much to the disgust of my dad who was a Ferrari fan. On top of that, the movie ‘Cars’ was put on at least once a week, I could have recited it by heart if you had asked me.

However, despite all this I never thought that racing would be something that I could do, it just seemed like such a fantasy lifestyle with the fast cars and talented drivers. To me it just didn’t seem real and I never thought about doing it myself.

Focusing on my 5-year-old aspirations of being a knight in shining armor was much more realistic than becoming a Formula 1 driver. As I grew up, I discovered karting and suddenly, racing became my passion. My mum took me to a rental karting where I was quick, I understood the racing lines and knew where to brake, I loved it.

After that I managed to get a chance to do a proper race day up at Boyndie Circuit. This was my first introduction to racing and I loved every second of it. The tracks were always busy, there was always something going on. The sounds and smells of a go kart track were completely insane. I was hooked and begging to do it all again. Since then, I haven’t looked back.

Stepping into the Vertu Motors MINI CHALLENGE is a huge step up for me. As a rookie, it fills me with excitement and hope for the season. There are many elements that I am looking forward to, but the main one is working with Excelr8 Motorsport. They hold such an impressive resume in not only this series but many others, including BTCC. Already, from my short time with them, I have only seen determination and drive to win, as well as encouragement to learn which I believe is so important, especially when you have rookie drivers. Justina and the team have welcomed me with open arms and have been absolutely amazing so far and I cannot wait to see where I can go with their support.

Vertu Motors MINI CHALLENGE is a highly competitive series which will require close racing where I will be learning on the go. I am looking forward and excited to learn new skills on some of the most legendary tracks in motorsport, including Silverstone and Brands Hatch, where I will be aiming to push for the best results I can. The high level of skill and talent amongst the other drivers on the grid will force me to adapt and learn quickly. It will be challenging, however, I am prepared to put in all my effort to ensure I can compete for strong results and continue improving throughout the season.

Overall, I am so excited to get the opportunity to get out on the track and race. It’s been a dream of mine for such a long time and I now finally get the chance. I’m willing to give it my all and push myself to the limit.

I couldn’t have made it to this point without the support from my EXCELR8 team, Ronan Pearson (BTCC Driver), as well as my sponsor and partners Saltire Energy and Global Sports Media. All of these people have made this possible and I am so grateful for all their help and encouragement throughout this process.

Racing Mini’s is such an invaluable experience. Close and compact racing forces you to learn how to get your elbows out and fight for your place on the track. Mini’s are fascinating cars to drive, they allow you to get a really good feel for the track and what you’re doing. It is an excellent and brilliant car to learn about racing.

I have always been very competitive in sports and strict with myself in terms of training. Since my introduction to racing, I’m making sure that my training also contains a great deal of time at the gym. Spending at least an hour and a half a day doing either cardio or gym work if I am not at a track. Juggling training with my studies is something that I’m getting better at as time goes on. I plan out what time I’m dedicating to physical training and what time I’m dedicating to school work. I am able to use school facilities to complete these workouts and runs which is very useful as I can go straight from lessons to the gym then to the library afterwards to continue with academic work. Other than the gym at school, I also do climbing after school twice a week at the local climbing center.

Juggling everything is an act of self-discipline and I know that if I manage my time well and do what I say I’m going to do then I can continue to race, train and do school work without any major problems.

I want to drive in BTCC one day, being able to watch the teams success and triumphs in the championship is hugely inspirational and I hope that I can push to do the same. Other than that, I’d love to try endurance racing or one day try out a single seater race car as both of these aspects of racing driving are of high interest to me and both incredibly different skills and speeds compared to BTCC.

In racing, I believe the key skills you need is the desire and need to win. If you aren’t here to win, then you have to ask yourself why you’re doing it. Due to this, you need determination and self-discipline to make yourself the best athlete possible, you need to be working harder than your competitors in every aspect, not just on track. You need the commitment to everything, you can’t just turn up every few weeks and drive the car, you need to have the commitment to push yourself past your limits, you need to commit to training and improving yourself as an athlete and a driver, you need to learn the car, understand what’s going on besides the driving. I am currently studying maths, computer science and PE at A Level in order to become the best athlete possible and to understand what my body is doing and how to push it to the max, and to understand the engineering of the car, to understand the data, everything I do, I do to improve myself and get the best results I can.

As well as this, you need self-belief, you need to be able to trust in your abilities to be the best driver, if you don’t believe you can win, then you won’t, it’s as simple as that. However, this does not need to translate into being arrogant, you still need to be open to learning and improving, taking in all the information that your team and other people give you, take in everything you can and use it all to your advantage, you never know what information will be useful.

I have always looked up to the likes of Michael Schumacher, always hearing stories about him. As a child I looked at him like he was some kind of superhuman, I didn’t think he was real. His driving style and pure determination is something really admirable, especially the records that he holds. As mentioned before, I always loved Sebastian Vettel and if someone were to ask me at any point of my life who I wanted to be like, I’d always say him. He was so much younger than all the drivers that I would watch, and he drove a blue car, which gave him bonus points in a child’s eyes. However, even growing up and watching, he drove with such purpose and control of the machinery, then on top of that what he stood for and how he became more than just a driver was hugely respectable and I strive to be able to drive like he has.

However, one of the most influential people to my career was introduced to me growing up as any time I mentioned that I loved Formula 1, one of the first people that would come up in conversation would be Susie Wolff. She very quickly became a legend in my eyes, nothing could touch her, the way people would talk about her with so much respect and tell me all about what she did then tell me to follow in her footsteps was so inspiring to a young girl. On top of this, driving at Boyndie Circuit, where she also raced, she was instantly the person I was compared to, and I thought this was incredible. The amount of respect and admiration I have for her and what she has accomplished is insane, and her story and career definitely played a huge part in me believing that racing would work out for me.