Both Powell and Kimilainen
spent time on the sidelinesHintsa guidance
has helped PowellDrivers get to
see rivals’ dataHONE
S^ BLOXHAMTRIENITZTRIENITZ17W SERIES
1 AUGUST 2019part of her racing set-up, which provides
her with more useful data to work from.
“In my race at the Norisring, my heart
rate was at 176bpm and usually in the
race because of the adrenaline that’s
happening all the time,” she says. “It’s
really interesting to see what it is in
the race and when I drive so that I can
improve those things outside the track.”
The Norisring marked Kimilainen’s
return after two months out and she
admits that the time lost has had an
eff ect that she’ll only be able to recover
from properly during the break between
the Brands Hatch fi nale and the as-yet-
unannounced 2020 season opener.
“Coming back from laying in bed for
two months, obviously I can feel it in myneck and that’s not fully recovered but they
have been taping it really well and I have
no symptoms now,” she says. “But still, my
neck and the strength is not on the same
level as it had been, and being in bed for
two months meant I lost a little condition
there as well, which I can feel and see.
“It’s just about maintaining the
condition I have now so that I can do
Brands Hatch. Then after that I’m fully
on training with my back and neck because
there’s no risk that anything can go wrong
that means I can’t race for a while.”
Former GP3 racer Alice Powell is another
driver for whom W Series represents a
return to regular racing, after fi ve years in
which she made only fl eeting appearances
due to a lack of funding. The 26-year-old is
clear that she has never underestimatedALL PHOTOGRAPHY
For Emma Kimilainen (left), who at 30 is
the oldest driver on the grid, this centralised
approach to coaching is a particularly
important part of the W Series experience- during a year in which she has both
returned to single-seater competition and
suff ered a neck injury after her clash with
Megan Gilkes at the Hockenheim season
opener, which forced her to miss the
subsequent Zolder and Misano rounds.
“I was a long time away from single-
seaters,” says Kimilainen, who has a
six-year-old daughter. Her previous
single-seater experience came in Formula
Palmer Audi in 2009. “I was on hiatus
from 2010-14, then when I came back to
racing I was driving touring cars. Single-
seaters are obviously more physical
because there are aerodynamics and
you can really feel it in the car.
“[Hintsa] personalise it by condition
tests, so we know what my maximum heart
rate level is, how fast I reach it and how
long I’m able to sustain it. You do the fi rst
tests so you know your base level and what
we need to improve, and there are plenty
of things I want to improve as well.
“Mobility is one of them – I’m a little
older than the other drivers and I can feel
that with my mobility. I need to take really
good care of my body, so all the muscular
care is really important so that I can do
the same level of training as the younger
drivers. I use maybe double the time they
use to maintain and keep my body healthy.”
For Assen winner Kimilainen, it’s the
fi rst time she’s used a heart rate monitor as“I use maybe double the time the younger
drivers use to keep my body healthy”