W Series rejected UK free-to-air TV offer

W Series CEO Catherine Bond-Muir claims she turned down an offer to show the all-female championship’s inaugural season on free-to-air television in the UK.

The new W Series was announced last October as a new championship to aid female participation in racing, funding an 18-strong grid of Formula 3 cars that would support six DTM rounds in 2019.

The all-female series has support from ex-Formula 1 racer David Coulthard and Red Bull technical chief Adrian Newey, and is set to debut on May 4 at Hockenheim.

Speaking to Crash.net, Bond Muir explained how she is working to find further partners and sponsors for the series in the coming months ahead of the series’ debut, including broadcast partners, calling interest in W Series “extraordinary.”

“We’re speaking to lots and lots of sponsors,” Bond Muir said.

“I think what we’ve got to do first in order to maximise sponsorship is to get our media deals in place. That’s what I’m working incredibly hard on at the moment.

“I’ve had to turn down terrestrial television here because we can’t have the right scheduling. So a really, really extraordinary response.”

Bond Muir admitted she was surprised by the response W Series had received since its launch and how far it had reached.

“We reached 101 million people across the world. In my wildest dreams, I would never have believed that we’d have got in the majority of global newspapers,” Bond-Muir said.

“So yes, I can’t say I expected it all. I’m amazed at how well it has been received all around the world. We’ve got a lot of interest in the UK, but we’re based in the UK and I would have expected it.

“It’s really the amount of press we’ve received internationally, it’s quite extraordinary.”

W Series confirmed its 60-driver longlist in December, and will stage trials to finalise its 18-driver grid and two reserves for the 2019 season later this month in Austria.