For three years straight, British race driver Jamie Chadwick was an undisputed champion. She won the inaugural W Series season in 2019, then came back to defend her title in ’21 and ’22. (There was no season in ’20 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.) In the new, women-only racing series, Chadwick held just about every record imaginable: She secured the most wins, podium finishes, pole positions and points. But in June, what was heralded as the first international women’s racing series in motorsport history officially went into administration (the U.K. equivalent of declaring bankruptcy). And with it went Chadwick’s shot to reestablish her dominance in ’24 with a fourth title.
But the 25-year-old’s driving career did not stop there—just as it did not begin with the W Series, either. Chadwick has been one of Williams Racing’s developmental drivers for four consecutive years. In 2015, she became the first woman to win a British GT Championship and was subsequently selected to be part of the Aston Martin Racing’s Driver Evolution Academy. Four years later, she drove in a class-winning team at the Nürburgring 24 Hours race in Germany. And now, for ’23, Chadwick has taken her talents Stateside to compete with the Andretti Autosport team in Indy NXT, a feeder series officially sanctioned by IndyCar. It presents a challenge with a longer, more aggressive style of racing, but it’s one that Chadwick has embraced wholeheartedly. She is the first woman to race full time as a part of the series’ mixed field in 13 years, and the only one out of 25 Indy NXT drivers this season. Financially backed by DHL, Chadwick’s move to the United States–based series is a chance, as many see it, to prove herself once again on an even bigger stage, against a larger field of drivers.
Not only is Chadwick competing on an entirely different continent this season (with the exception of one W Series race in Austin two years ago), but she’s also driving in a heavier car that requires more physicality and power to race in. The move to Indy NXT also means she is learning to race on ovals, as well, which demands a different strategy than road racing. The 2023 season kicked off in March, and though there was quite a learning curve as she adjusted to the new series, Chadwick has now notched four top-10 finishes in a row. The first came at the start of July, which she followed up with another at Iowa Speedway (her first oval race) three weeks later, before sailing into August with a climb from P17 to eight at the Music City Grand Prix. Most recently, she finished 10th at the By Firestone Grand Prix in Indianapolis.
