Sarah Moore ready for life back in W Series fast lane after supermarket deliveries

The Harrogate-born W Series athlete is eager for the competition’s return in 2021, after the 2020 season was thrown off track by the Covid-19 pandemic.

The all-female single-seater championship first ran in 2019 with drivers competing in Formula 3-specified cars.

Moore, 26, was among the first to compete, finishing eighth in the drivers’ standings in 2019.

The Yorkshire driver has been racing since she was four years old and made history when she became the first woman to win a TOCA-sanctioned race, on her way to winning the Ginetta Junior Championship title in 2009. She also claimed the Britcar Endurance title in 2018. The enforced break caused by Covid-19 is the longest she has spent out of the sport.

It was something that had started to impact her mental health, so she turned to what she knows best – driving. The 26-year-old took on a job as a delivery driver for Sainsbury’s

“It was a couple of months into the first lockdown, my mental health was struggling a bit,” she told The Yorkshire Post.

“But it was nice to be helping others out more than anything else. The job at Sainsbury’s is part-time but I also do invoicing for my brother’s company, he is a mechanic. So I have two jobs to balance alongside training and everything for racing. It is a bit crazy.”

She continued: “For me, I have been lucky in that I fell into a job with Sainsbury’s. That helped me a lot with my mental health, in terms of having that normality back in my life. It gave me something to get up for on a daily basis.”

The final race of the 2019 W Series was in August, meaning that by the time Moore returns to the track competitively, she will have been out of action in a Formula 3 car for almost two years.

Moore did manage to get some laps under her belt in 2020, competing in rounds four and five of the Porsche Sprint Challenge which was held across England and Scotland.

The 2021 W Series season is due to begin on June 26 in Le Castellet, France, in the first of eight races to be staged across the globe. The provisional schedule concludes in Mexico City, Mexico on October 30. All eight races will be held alongside the Formula 1 Grand Prix events.

“It seems like it has been forever. I almost can’t remember the last time I stepped out of the car,” added Moore.

“I was lucky enough to race twice last year but it has been since August, 2019 that I was last in a W Series car.

“I can’t wait to get back on the track and be with all the girls again. This is the longest period I have gone without racing since I was four years old. It has been tough.

“The biggest challenge is the same that a lot of people have probably faced in the impact it has had on my mental health.

“I spend my life pretty much at a race track, so I don’t have many friends close to home.

“I live up north and most of the racing drivers live in the Midlands or in the south. The fitness side of things was pretty tough to keep going as well.”

Moore added: “I have raced at Silverstone, I have been lucky to race there quite a few times.

“But to race there on a Formula 1 weekend and for it to be classed as a home Grand Prix, I think it will be the highlight for all us British drivers, that is for sure. Especially with the downforce of the F3 cars on that track, it is such a fast track so it will be demanding.”

After an eighth-placed finish in 2019, Moore wants to break into the top five in 2021, adding: “After having a year-and-a-half off and not racing anything as physically demanding as that car, I think the first time I get back in it will be a bit of a shock to the system. I am still aiming for a top five but I am just looking forward to getting back in the car, more than anything.”

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