Bianca Bustamante on carving her own path in motorsport: “I didn’t feel like I belonged”

Few sports have a higher barrier for entry than professional motorsport. The history of Formula One specifically, established in 1950, is built on exclusivity and opulence through its associated sponsors, elite car manufacturers, and the high-flying stars at the very top. 

Another undeniable truth is the identity of motorsport’s biggest names. Whether contemporaries like Lewis Hamilton or Max Verstappen, or legends like Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna, success in motorsport is synonymous with men. In fact, only five women have ever competed in a Formula One Grand Prix, with the last being Italy’s Giovanna Amati in 1992. 

There have always been prominent women in motorsport – with names like Susie Wolff and Danica Patrick prevalent today – but there’s been a greater push recently to open pathways for aspiring female drivers to break down these male-dominated perceptions. 

One rising star who has benefitted from these initiatives is 20-year-old Bianca Bustamante, who was the second driver to join the female-only F1 Academy series, established in 2023.

She later became female driver to join McLaren’s Driver Development Programme, and recently completed her rookie season in the GB3 Championship for Elite Motorsport, where she stepped up to a faster and more aerodynamic formula car, competing against a predominantly male grid of drivers.

Bustamante’s ascent, however, while beginning from an early age, wasn’t pre-determined. Her passion for motorsport stemmed from her father, which led to her driving go-karts from the age of three. “It was all he ever really spoke about, to be honest,” Bustamante told Rolling Stone UK. 

“It was all I was ever surrounded by; motorsport and cars and Formula One, and that’s where the passion grew. At the age of three, I drove my first ever go-kart. At the age of six, I competed in national racing events, and I guess the rest is history, which is quite funny because I come from a country that’s not generally known for racing.”

The lack of infrastructures dedicated to motorsport in the Philippines, aside from karting, put Bustamante’s prospects at “quite a big disadvantage”, but she was also dealing with a level of separation from her peers. “Every time that I practiced on circuits, I would always be the only girl,” she said. “Not even sisters or moms would be at the track. It would always kind of be a father and son bonding experience. I think that was my first realisation that I was pursuing something that is a little bit unheard of from where I come from.”

While this didn’t shake her ambitions, the masculine culture around racing presented questions around the system and her own identity. She had always been “very feminine and girly”, but the pressures of trying to fit in were at odds with her other interests. “I dressed myself up to be more boisterous, more boyish, just so I’d look like and act like my peers,” she said. “As much as I loved racing, I was still very into fashion and into dolls and Barbies and all those things. So I lived with both passions in my heart, which was often frowned upon in motorsport because everyone always tells you to be strong, fierce and fearless – you know, driving at speeds of 130 kilometres per hour at the age of 12. 

“It didn’t bother me, but at the same time, it didn’t make me feel like I belonged in the sport. It didn’t really feel like there was a safe space where I could exhibit both my characteristics of the feminine and masculine side.”

Beyond her father’s influence, Bustamante credits video games for deepening her enthusiasm for motorsport – by making it accessible to those who don’t have a Formula One race track on their doorstep. “I lived predominantly my whole childhood gaming because it was the only thing that we could afford,” she said. “It was so easy to buy a PlayStation 3, put in an F1 game, and drive around rather than actually driving an actual Formula One car.”

The route from driving simulators to professional motorsport careers has been well documented over the years. The most famous case, British driver Jann Mardenborough, was the basis of the 2023 feature film Gran Turismo. While there are some hurdles in making the transition (finances aside), the lines between racing and its virtual equivalent are more blurred than any other sport out there – both in competitions like the Formula One Esports Series and transferable skills. 

For Bustamante, driving simulators “intensified the passion” for motorsport, as they were the only way she could see race circuits at a young age. “It heightened all the excitement. The only time I’d see Monza or Barcelona, all those tracks that I’m racing at now, it was only through gaming that I saw them when I was 12 years-old. So it is funny thinking of it that way.”

This connection to gaming has solidified for Bustamante in other ways. Since moving to the UK two years ago, she’s partnered with EA Sports, alongside other rising stars in the world of sport, on a programme designed to help support their careers on and off their field of play, which has included creating and sharing her own personal music playlist through the GEN / EA SPORTS x Spotify playlist series. Beyond EA SPORTS F1 titles, EA holds significance as the creators of another game which provided a different kind of escape for her growing up. 

“I’m a bit embarrassed talking about it, but I think I’ll have to… I love The Sims,” she laughs. “I did grow up a little bit sheltered – I’m not sure ‘sheltered’ is the right word – but I didn’t really have a childhood apart from the track, because I was so committed to racing I forgot to live outside of it. I was homeschooled, most of my childhood I spent at the track. I didn’t really go to an actual high school and experience prom, making friends, and everything. So whenever I was home and not on the [racing] sim or driving, I’d just be playing The Sims.

“I’d create this entire new world and let my creativity flourish. I think that’s where most of my creativity stems from – why I really, really love architecture. I remember being like 13 or 14, and just building a house on The Sims, and designing everything and buying furniture. And because of that, my passion for architecture grew. I love drawing, and it was something that I did really want to take in university, but of course life had other plans, and I became a professional racing driver. But a lot of those games I played pretty much my whole life.”

Bustamante’s big picture goal is to reach Formula One, but through all the changes she’s seen within motorsport in her career so far, there’s a sense the entire industry is making that dream more achievable for everyone in her shoes. 

“The sport has grown massively throughout the past decade. I never thought that it would be what it is now – especially having lived all those barriers myself from the young age of six. Now, I’ve lived the criticism, I’ve lived the negative talks of people saying that racing is for boys. Or you’re never going to make it because you’re not strong enough, not quick enough, or X, Y & Z and so on. I’ve lived all those hindrances. 

“Everyday we wake up to new initiatives, teams, or championships by women in motorsport  – all these initiatives that are now led by mostly women, which is incredible. Not only do we have a place where we can belong, but it is now highly encouraged for girls to pursue racing – to the point where there’s almost a need for women to be in the sport, not just for drivers, but for mechanics and engineers [too].”