L-r: Giuseppe D’Arrigo,
Stephanie Travers, Nasri
Shafie and Toto Wolffa one-minute video answering some questions from Valtteri Bottas
and the team,” she says. “That went out to Petronas worldwide to
be voted on, and from there I made it to the fi nal fi ve.
“For the last round of tests the fi ve of us went to Malaysia,
where we had to complete a case-study interview, based on our
interpretation of on-track activities. From there the last three of
us did a fi nal stage – an amazing race through Kuala Lumpur, kind of
like a treasure hunt, where we had to follow a series of clues to locate
the CEO [D’Arrigo] and do a fi nal interview with him. That was as
diffi cult as interviews are – but I’m here now, so I made it through!”
Travers offi cially joined the team in February during testing at
Barcelona, working alongside Nasri Shafi e in the Petronas tracksidefl uids lab. Next season she’ll remain with Mercedes and mentor the
winner of this year’s global search, which Petronas announced at the
German Grand Prix in late July. Tough it may be, but the application
process is entirely meritocratic.
“The competition was certainly a level playing fi eld in terms of
male and female participation,” says Travers. “It certainly wasn’t
easy. For me, motor racing being a male-dominated sport didn’t
deter me in any way, and it still doesn’t bother me. I was one of
only fi ve girls in my [student] cohort so I was used to being
surrounded by men. I saw the opportunity and went for it.”
The search for a new trackside fl uid engineer remains open, and
you can apply by visiting the Petronas Lubricants International
LinkedIn page or emailing your details to ptfe2020@pli-petronas.
com. We’d wish you luck – but this is one competition where luck
doesn’t come into the equation.“For me, motor racing being a male-
dominated sport didn’t deter me in any
way, and it still doesn’t bother me”
a cousin who worked in the DTM. So I’d grown up in and around
motorsport events, and that really inspired me – I knew one day
I wanted to work in that world. I had a preference for F1 because
that’s the one I enjoyed the most.
“But I knew I wanted to keep the chemistry side going rather
than studying something like, say, automotive engineering. I wanted
to stay within the engineering world but on the chemistry side, so
I did that and maths, plus further maths, and that enabled me to
study chemical engineering at Bradford University. I completed
my undergrad studies there, got a fi rst class, then went on to
Imperial University to do my postgrad degree.”
By pure coincidence, Travers’s fi rst job was with a company that
enjoys a much-mythologised role in F1: BASF. In 1983 a subsidiary
of the multinational chemicals giant unearthed a Second World
War-era aircraft fuel mix that enabled BMW to unleash more than
1400bhp from its 1.5-litre turbocharged four-cylinder engines in
qualifying trim, thanks to the fuel’s anti-knock properties. Travers’s
role as asset care engineer, though, didn’t involve stealthy trips to
the BASF archive to locate abstruse lead-replacement formulas.
“I was working on a chemicals site in Leeds – it had only been
a year since I graduated – when I saw the advert for the Petronas
search,” she says. “I applied and went through the fi ve-stage
process. The application was just a CV and covering letter,
then the next stage was a psychometric test...”
Psychometric tests – whether numerical or verbal, or a
combination of the two – are typical elements of many corporate
recruitment programmes, as are examinations based on logical
or mechanical reasoning, or critical thinking. Usually performed
against the clock, they’re a highly eff ective (if ruthless) method
of fi ltering candidates whose educational background and
qualifi cations look similar on paper. The timed format and
prevalence of trick questions highlight those hopefuls whose
capacity for attention to detail doesn’t wilt under deadline pressure.
Travers was one of just a handful of candidates to pass this stage.
“After that I was selected to go into the top 10 and had to create
22 AUGUST 2019 AUTOSPORT.COM 37PETRONAS WINNER