You may not have heard about Alice Robshaw-Hughes but if things go her way you’ll be hearing a lot more about this talented young driver.
Everyone who has worked with her in her career so far has been impressed by her talent at such a young age. Alice started her racing career in National Autograss, one of the most competitive amateur racing championships in the UK. Alice had plenty of success in Autograss racing at the front of the Class 1 Junior and winning the Ladies Class 1 National championship at the finals meeting in 2014 having had plenty of success at local and regional level to get to the two day event.
However Alice’s target is the BTCC and so a move to circuit racing was needed and so in 2015 she stepped up to the Mighty Mini championship where she immediately made an impression;
“Jonathan Lewis ran my mini for the first two meetings of the year. He also helped me pass my ARDS test with some training at Snetterton and Rockingham.” said Alice “I don’t know whether it was a sales tactic or just something else, but he said it was 12 years since he has seen a girl come through with the natural ability I had. He also said there was an opening in the market for a good British female driver.”
Alice has taken well to circuit racing in 2015 with the help of fellow Mighty Mini’s racer Maria Brown, so well that it’s been decided for Alice to take another step in 2016. She plans to move up to the 750 Motor Club’s Hot hatch championship. This is a new championship which had it’s first season this year. The cars are all the previous model Ford Fiesta ST with two classes, one for standard cars and one for modified machinery.
“The Mighty Minis championship has been an amazing introduction to circuit racing, however, as a driver I’d like to experience more power where the accelerator isn’t just a switch. The Fiesta ST is under build at the moment as it has to be ready for the 750 Motor Club stand at Autosport International. As I’m the only girl driver in the stock hatch and hot hatch series, they thought it’d be a good idea to use my car as one of the promotion cars on the stand. Tom Bell has played a massive part in making it all happen; we are all looking forward to it!”
Alice’s father Steve Hughes has so far been Alice’s main sponsor but with every step up needing more money, Alice needed to find further backing for 2016 if she was to continue her dream and Alice already has her first new backer for 2016 as her father explains;
“Alice has her first sponsor with Race Engineering from Hull. They will provide machine time and labour on the Fiesta ST. After watching her race at Donnington Park last weekend, you can see her car control is amazing. The public awareness she created racing at Donnington put me in shock. I now fully believe she has what it takes to make it. We just need some small investments for this promising young girl, so that she can show the boys how it’s done, and head onto great things within British motorsport.”
Alice will be the sole female driver in the Hot Hatch championship aiming to prove she can be one of the quickest on track. She’ll also be doing as much as she can to promote herself and raise her profile to gain new backing to help her succeed in motorsport hopefully to the BTCC and beyond!
Alice has created an opportunity for fans and Motorsport enthusiasts to contribute to and be part of her racing career. Using a website called my race fund you can help her race her Fiesta in the Hot Hatch championship 2016. Itll be shown on MotorsTV so even if you can’t get to a track to support Alice you’ll still be able to keep up with her progress.
Contributing to Alice’s budget will also automatically make you part of the Alice Hughes Motorsport team owners club, and you will be kept up to date with promotions and opportunities to be part of the team!
You can visit her page at My Race Fund to find out more; Click Here By Marc Waller
