NMSF in search of best female racers

Zakiya Tjongarero won the Girls on Track development program session held on Saturday at Tony Rust Race Track in Windhoek by the Namibia Motorsport Federation (NMSF) in conjunction with the International Automobile Federation (FIA).

Derek Jacobs, the secretary-general of the Namibia Motorsport Federation, said the programme is aimed to bridge the gap in a male-dominated sport and to find and develop promising women racers in Namibia.

The session saw over 20 girls from under 14 to U18 get an in-depth experience of motorsport from the grassroots level.

Jacobs said: “The girls’ skills were tested in kart racing, nutrition and fitness with a health and fitness professional, as well as a science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) challenge where they had to build a car from cardboard and power it with a balloon.

“Today was the first of many to come; we are going to take this programme around the rest of the country as we aim to put 300 girls through this programme by the beginning of December this year. We will take the best girls out of the overall programme and work with them to ride a development kart for next year.”