Kimilainen took her first
win at Assen from PowellKimilainen heads points
leader Chadwick at AssenTRIENITZTRIENITZ19W SERIES
1 AUGUST 2019the importance of performance training
and maintaining her condition away from
the track, which has paid dividends with
a podium in every race she has fi nished.
“Luckily I love sport so you’ll always
fi nd me playing hockey or football in the
winter,” says Powell, whose title hopes
took a dent with a startline crash at
Misano and mechanical problems at
the Norisring. “I’ve never given up
trying to keep fi t or stopped training.
“Coming back, I was expecting to
struggle more physically. But I kept the
training up because I actually enjoy it.
While some people might think it’s
a bit of a chore, it’s so important.”
From the beginning, W Series has
faced criticism for segregating female
drivers. This, coupled with high-profi le
television coverage on Channel 4 in the
UK – as well as being available free-to-
air internationally – means that W Series
and its drivers have been placed under
an almost microscopic level of scrutiny
compared to any other junior formula
at the same level.
Undoubtedly, this creates a high-
pressure environment for the drivers,
with current championship leader and
Williams Formula 1 development driver
Jamie Chadwick admitting that she could
feel the extra pressure of media interest at
Hockenheim. Equipping its drivers with
the ability to deal with this pressure – and
the spotlight that comes with advancing
further up the motorsport ladder – is of
the utmost importance to the series and
ties in with Hintsa’s ‘holistic’ approach
to unlocking performance.
“The mental side is just huge,” says
Kimilainen. “For me to be a little older
and more experienced, as well as having
a family, has bought me a lot of things
that I didn’t have before.
“Ten years ago, mentally I wanted
everything really fast and I wasn’t patient
enough. Now I’m really patient, because
you know – kids! – and you really do
have to be patient with kids. But also,
it’s just knowing myself better and not
fully putting my identity into being a
driver. Even though I love racing, it’s my
huge passion and I’ve done a lot of work
for it, it’s still not all of who I am. That’s
the biggest thing that I’ve realised in
the past four years.
“Psychology is the thing that really
separates us. There are plenty of drivers
who are really talented and are on the same
level physically, or someone can be on a
better or worse level, but it’s the mental
level that really separates you in the end.”
Powell is also quick to draw attention
to the importance of mental resilience,
and it’s a message she passes on to the
younger drivers she coaches herself,
notably 12-year-old karter Ella Stevens.
“I’ve learned a lot and I just try to pass
that on, not to make the same mistakes
that I did,” she says. “Now all us drivers
realise how important the psychological
side is. It’s really good to teach them,
especially at a young age so that they’re
already in that way of thinking.
“W Series is here to teach us and guide
us in so many diff erent ways and there are
so many elements to driving that are reallyimportant. The support we have here is
fantastic. Hintsa do an awesome job at a
race weekend aiding us, making sure we’re
drinking the right amount of fl uids and
warming up before we get in the car.”
Kimilainen agrees that W Series’ links
with Hintsa Performance are a “huge
privilege” and encourages the younger
drivers to make full use of its support.
“It’s going to help them for the rest
of their lives,” she says. “If they take
everything that Hintsa says into them,
put it into action and start living like that
nutrition-wise, training-wise and mentally,
they will be better people, not just drivers.”
It remains to be seen whether W Series
will succeed in its mission to bring a
female driver to Formula 1, but it’s clear
that by centralising the importance of
driver performance to its very ethos,
W Series is setting a solid foundation for
its drivers in whatever they might do next.
It’s an example that other championships
might do well to adopt to o. Q“W Series guides us in so many different ways.
The support we have here is fantastic”