Watch Caitlin Wood make her season debut in W Series Round 4 action from Budapest - LIVE and FREE via SBS On Demand from 12:30am (AEST) on Saturday, July 31.
Wood is set to make her season debut in the fourth round this weekend, having been unable to compete since Brands Hatch back in August 2019.
The 24-year-old’s preparations for the 2020 season were brought to a premature end due to the coronavirus pandemic, with the UK-based Australian forced to keep fit from home and away from family.
Though “very hard”, the upcoming meet in Hungary is a just reward for Wood, who hopes to secure a top 10 finish on a circuit she holds high on her list of favourites.
“I raced there in 2016, in GT4 as one of my first-ever races in in Europe, when I came over,” Wood told SBS Sport.
“I thoroughly enjoyed it back then. It's been a long time since and I'm in a completely different car now, jumping into single-seaters, but I'm really, really looking forward to getting back out there.
“It’s such a technical circuit with some really fast bits, so I think it'll make for some really exciting racing.
“Obviously, I want to be competitive; I want to be in the top 10 at a minimum to be honest, and we’ll just take it from there.
“It's been a long time coming and I’ve just really got to enjoy the opportunity.”
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The “opportunity” is one the driver from Maitland, New South Wales will forever remain grateful for as the W Series seeks to highlight the growing number of female athletes in motorsport.
“I've been involved in motorsports since I was seven so it’s such a drastic change from when I first started,” she said.
“The main thing is just the number of women and girls getting involved which is so great to see. When I was seven, I was the only girl and that was just really common.
“I'd go to race meetings or kart meetings and when I saw another girl, I was like, ‘hey dad, there's another one, there's another one of me’, and now it's so much better than that.
“Representation matters and I think that is what the W Series is all about.
“I think that's really important and that's something that I’ve come to understand a bit more – that without little girls or women seeing it happen, how do they know that it's possible?
“I'm forever grateful for the W Series for the opportunity and I think all the girls on the grid are, and it's really important that these programs are available for the young girls and women to see that it is possible.
“I've had some really great life experiences from being involved in motorsport, so the more diversity and the more inclusion we have in this sport, I think it just makes it better.”
A total of 12 nations are represented in the W Series standings ahead of the round at Hungaroring, with British trio Alice Powell, Jamie Chadwick and Sarah Moore rounding out the top three thus far.
Wood, however, is the only Australian competing on the European stage, but it’s a position she holds with immense pride and one she’ll look to retain as her career continues.
“I'm extremely grateful to be able to represent my country and now on an international level with the W Series,” she added.
“I always want to represent it to a really great standard and do, not only myself proud, but the country proud.
“Hopefully I can keep doing that for years to come.”
