First details of 2024 FIM Women’s Motorcycle World Championship are confirmed
The new series will be a six-round season, featuring at existing WorldSBK rounds.
2024 FIM Women’s Motorcycle World Championship schedule
- Emilia Romagna Round, Misano World Circuit “Marco Simoncelli” - June 14th-16th
- UK Round, Donington Park Circuit - July 12th-14th
- Portuguese Round, Autodromo Internacional do Algarve - August 9th-11th
- Hungarian Round, Balaton Park Circuit - August 23rd-25th
- talian Round, Cremona Circuit - September 20th-22nd
- Spanish Round, Circuito de Jerez-Angel Nieto - October 11th-13th
2024 FIM Women’s Motorcycle World Championship weekend format
- Friday - Superpole
- Saturday - Race 1
- Sunday - Race 2
Yamaha are the sole manufacturer for the championship. Every rider will be equipped with a YZF-R7 model.
“A single technical and logistic partner will oversee all technical aspects, ensuring a level playing field for all riders,” it was announced.
Prospective riders are encouraged to apply between November 13th, 2023, to January 31st, 2024.
The €25,000 entry fee includes “a comprehensive package, such as the use of Yamaha YZF R7 MY 2023, a GYTR Racing Kit, Pirelli tyres, fuel, racing service and access to the Paddock Village”.
Jorge Viegas, FIM President, stated: "In the FIM, we have been working very hard to include more and more women in racing in the last 20 years, since we created the Women Commission. We already have Women's Championships in Motocross, Enduro, and Trial, and we are going to have Speedway very soon. When we started to think about a Circuit Racing Championship, Dorna embraced this project and we've been working together since April, and I think Gregorio (Lavilla) did a very good job. There is a lot of demand from women to join this Championship. There will be women coming from Japan, from the United States, from Latin America, and from Europe, of course. I think it will be a big success."
Gregorio Lavilla, WorldSBK Executive Director, added: "When we started with this project, we thought about many types of formats, many conditions, and we ended up with a solution that we think is feasible. This is a growing project that will develop depending on the feedback from the spectators, from the riders, from manufacturers. Since 2020, we started doing two races in all our categories, and this Championship will have the same format, qualifying, and two races. The schedule of next year's weekends is going to be tight because we will have a lot of races. But I think that's good for the motorcycling fans. I would also like to mention all the partners, like Yamaha, who had a positive response when we knocked on their doors. Today is a great day to start a new project."
FIM Women in Motorcycling Commission Director, Janika Judeika, also shared her thoughts: "Today is a special day as we present the first-ever FIM World Championship for Women in Circuit Racing. The FIM launched a project dedicated to women in Circuit Racing ten years ago with the first-ever training camp on the circuit in Albacete, Spain. Four other camps then followed between 2013 and 2015 in the Czech Republic and Qatar with an average number of twenty-four participants from four continents and twelve countries. In 2014, as part of this project and thanks to the support of Midori Moriwaki, an all-female team took part in the Suzuka 4 Hours that included Shelina Moreda and Melissa Paris also in 2015 with Shelina and Avalon Biddle. Already at that time, it was clear that there were fast women who were also clamoring to have their own championship. I am pretty sure that among the women who will now participate in this new FIM World Championship will be some of those who have previously participated in the FIM circuit racing training camps where the aim was to bring together fast women and to understand when the time would be right to create their own championship. This is now a reality!"
Eric de Seynes, President and CEO, Yamaha Motor Europe, was proud to be a key part in providing the machinery: "Yamaha likes to win, but Yamaha also wants to support the sport from all different aspects, and we think that as a manufacturer, we have to take our responsibility. We cannot be proud to win, supervise, and ignore all the rest of the pyramid. If we want to be champions, we have to take care of the young champions of all the different classes and help them progress year after year. Also, in motocross, we have always supported the women riders in the Women Championships. We have won many times, and when this idea was raised, we were absolutely motivated to support it because you have to understand that in many cases, there is a difficulty for the riders coming from national championships to get the label at the World Championship level. And it's exactly the same for women. 30% of our customers are women, and they want to race. With this Championship, we will give the correct step for women to demonstrate their talent."
2023 Women’s European Champion Beatriz Neila concluded the quotes, saying: "In my opinion, there has always been women competing against men. But it's true that in that period of time, no one has reached the top of the category, MotoGP or Superbike. Why? It's like this because women and men are different, are physically different. And for that the present of this Championship allows women to fight for a world title, to have the ranking, to see who is the fastest woman in the world, season by season, to be recognised, to take advantage of our status as a woman in the world of motorbikes, and to show the world what women can do on a bike. All of this can be achieved by creating a women's World Championship in which we can compete women against women. It is a reference for a new generation, and I know that this Championship will be really interesting and a new opportunity for women. And today is the start of something amazing."
