I followed my dream as a child and I'm loving every minute of it.
— Susie Wolff
For me, it's all about taking things a step at a time, proving I'm good enough and on the right path.
Love it or hate it, motorsport is not purely talent. It never has been and never will be.
I have the deepest admiration for Angela Palmer and her work so having my helmet as her subject has been a true honour for me. I think the sculpture is stunning and very striking, it's the most incredible combination of strength with fragility.
I started racing at club level, then the Scottish championship, then the British championship, then the European, then the Worlds. I went through all the various ranks. I spent a good ten years doing karting.
I'm a development driver, which means I'll be doing a lot of work in the simulator.
I'm a great believer that if you knock on enough doors and stay at the level maybe an opportunity comes.
Because it was my decision to stop racing, I feel fine not being a driver anymore.
I love reading fashion magazines, buying handbags, the usual things - but when you're in the moment and focusing on setting up the car, how you look is so irrelevant.
I'm not like other females. I'm obviously different because of the path I've taken. I'm just as aggressive as the guys when I get my helmet on. Plus F1 is not just about taking risks, but knowing when to take risks and when to back off. It's also about strategy and managing your tyres.
One of the whole reasons for starting my initiative, Dare to be Different, is about getting more girls interested in motorsport and that's everywhere, not just driving on track but creating a network where they have the support around them.
We have to stop this stereotype that for girls it's about being in pink and horse riding. We need to teach kids to think outside the box, to dare girls to be different.
Your gender becomes irrelevant when you are in a performance-based environment.
It's very important to me to give something back - to pass on my know-how, to give all the lessons I learned onto the next generation so they don't make the same mistakes.
Many people talk about me entering the history books as the first female in 22 years and what a big moment it was. And I'm very flattered that I managed to do something historic, but in all honesty I was out there for me as a racing driver and to show everybody what Susie Wolff is capable of not to put my name in the history books.
As soon as you start listening to the gossip surrounding you, you just get dragged down by it.
I was very lucky in that my parents supported my racing so much - they just said ‘whatever you want to achieve, if you work hard enough you can achieve it.' They never, ever let me believe that, as a female, I couldn't compete in a man's world.
I realised at 13 or 14 when I said, OK, I wanted to be professional racing driver, there wasn't anyone to look up to that I could aspire to or get inspiration from. But that didn't stop me.
An all-women championship is giving up on the mission of eventually making girls compete on a high level and against the boys in Formula One. It is undermining what girls are able to achieve.
I am not someone who lets my head get down.
I was always very clear when I took some time out to start a family that I wanted to come back and get my teeth into something and of course I could not work for Toto or a competing manufacturer.
I think as much as people talk about Scotland as being a place where it's raining all the time it's a fantastic country. Considering it's such a small country you have to realise how successful it's been in the world of motor sport.
As a woman people judge you on your looks regardless of the fact you're just there to race.
I'm very ambitious but realistic.
When you're a driver, you are very selfish and you only need to focus on your own performance because ultimately, it's your name on the side of the car.
As a racing driver, you're representing a brand and your appearance is part of your job. But there's a fine line between being feminine and creating attention on yourself because of what you're wearing.
It is a hugely embarrassing situation to find myself in, I'm a professional driver and to be caught speeding and to have my licence taken away for speeding, it would have an effect on my reputation.
A woman can be physically fit enough to drive a Formula 1 car. I did the race distance in Barcelona so I have proved that it is possible.
We want to get more women into the sport, whether that be marshals, volunteers, engineers, female racing drivers. We want to open up the sport and show there's opportunities out there.
My fundamental aim is to drive female talent - it's not just to find the next female Formula One superstar.
In my time in F1, I never doubted I could be successful. I sadly never made it on to the starting grid of an F1 race, but during testing I completed a race distance.
Ultimately, we have got to make our sport more diverse if we want to be relevant in the future.
People will say I'm only where I am because of my husband or because the team might want to employ a woman, but you don't get to drive a Formula 1 car unless you're good enough, especially with a top team like Williams.
Nobody says Nico Rosberg is only in F1 because his dad was a famous racing driver who funded his karting career and helped him get into F1. It s a bit unfair just to focus on the fact that my husband is in F1 and it's the only reason I'm in an F1 car.
There always will be stereotypes that women can't drive. When I hear the comments, it just makes me more determined to prove them wrong.
When a sport comes down to physical power, then it definitely needs to be split between men and women, but motor racing is a little bit like horse riding where we fight with the same tools. I believe that motor racing is a sport where women can take on men.
Just as sport can, art has the capacity to cross so many boundaries like education, race and religion.
When I decided to stop as a racing driver in 2015, I knew I wanted to continue with the challenge of competitive motorsport.
I'm simply trying to go as far as I can go in racing.
Coming to new environments, people look at you and think, ‘what's this blonde lady doing, she thinks she can drive a racing car.' But you work hard, keep your head down and show that you're actually capable.
When I stopped racing, I kept being asked to comment on diversity in the sport but I really felt I had done my part.
It's all very well to talk about how it would be great to have a woman driver, a woman with sponsors and marketing, that's all great but to get into that drive you have to perform. That's what I realized early on when I got into Formula One.
Do I care about what men say at the race track? No, not at all. I've always said I race for me, because I love racing. I don't race to prove a point about how well a woman can do against men on the track.
I'm not a girl racer, I save my speed for the race track.
The reality is that family is on the cards in the future. But you know in motorsport if you take yourself off to have children, you won't come back, partly as you're quickly forgotten in this sport.
When I was driving the simulator, out of the three engineers I worked with one was a woman. So it was very difficult for me to turn around and tell people that I worked in a male-dominated environment, because it wasn't.
Ultimately, when you're out on track with your helmet on, nobody can see the driver. Nobody can judge you on what you look like if your hair is long or short, if you're black or you're white, if you're male or female. All that matters is your performance.
To make it in Formula 1, which is the absolute pinnacle, is incredibly tough no matter what your gender.
Throughout my whole racing career, I was always asked about being a woman in a man's world. Interestingly when you are in that world, there's no reason for it to be a man's world, there are successful women and I didn't find there to be any barriers to stop me from being successful.
It doesn't bother me if I'm getting attention because I'm a girl.
