Farah AlYousef will have her mother cheering her on from the Jeddah Corniche Circuit stands when she takes to the track for Hitech as the F1 Academy wildcard entry this weekend. It will be another poignant moment in AlYousef’s fledging motorsport career, which has already brought both success and progression at the age of 22. It is a far cry from her mother’s experience of cars. She does not drive. She never wants to learn and, regardless, for many years in Saudi Arabia she would not have been legally allowed to do so.
This will be a home race for AlYousef, not only is she Saudi Arabian, but she hails from Jeddah and has already driven an F1 Academy car around the track having taken part in a test here a fortnight ago. She is not the first Saudi to take the wildcard entry on offer in F1 Academy, the female-only series that runs its seven race weekends alongside the Formula 1 calendar. But she admits to feeling the pressure of representing a minority that has only been able to hold a drivers’ licence since 2018.
