zzdcar
Home
/
Reviews
/
Racing
/
Stop Letting Carmen Jorda Speak For All Women
Stop Letting Carmen Jorda Speak For All Women-November 2024
2024-02-19 EST 22:11:16

When a person like former Lotus Formula One development driver talks about how women are less capable as racing drivers than men—and she does, a lot—there’s an urge to treat it as an offhand comment with no merit. That’s particularly true when the person has a history of not helping the people they’re speaking about.

While what Jorda says is troubling and probably flat-out wrong, the biggest problem is that her voice is given a lot of weight in the racing press—so much so that it often drowns out other voices. Jorda isn’t barometer for how all, or even most, women think, yet her voice is treated as particularly important, even when she says it’s “not for [her] to decide what’s good for women.”

The latest example Jorda’s troubling comments came after she before the series’ race in Mexico City last weekend. After she got done, reports that she said it’s a series more women should focus on reaching.

According to ESPN, someone asked Jorda if she thought a Formula E car is easier to drive for women—which, it’s a story in itself who asked this why they thought it was an appropriate or beneficial question to ask, but we’ll save that for another day. Jorda said she thinks so, as quoted by ESPN.

That’s an expected answer from Jorda, who, despite having beaten men in her racing career, in motorsports.

She was also recently and controversially chosen to , a group within the governing body of dozens of international racing series like F1, intended to “promote the involvement of women at all levels of motorsport.”

Here’s what Jorda, who has said again and again that she thinks women “will never be the same” as men and that a female championship will give women a better shot at driving, said about women’s chances with a Formula E race car in comparison to F1, via ESPN:

“It’s a less physical car than in Formula One because of the downforce and because of the power steering as well. So yes, for sure. The challenge that we women have in Formula Two and Formula One is a physical issue and I think in Formula E, we won’t have it.

“It’s not for me to decide what’s good for women or not in the sport. But in my experience I can say Formula One — not all the other championships, karting, Formula Three, GT, I think women are capable of good results in all those series — in Formula One and Formula Two there is a barrier that is a physical issue. I think there is a big issue for women and that’s why there aren’t any in those championships.”

She added: “We have to consider Formula E as a very high level championship. You can see all the drivers who are here, the car that I tested is not a super-difficult car to drive, but there are so many different things that you have to learn how to manage. It’s a challenging championship. It’s a high level in motorsport. To have a woman here, Formula E has already had some women here, so why not to have more?”

Even worse than Jorda’s consistent narrative about women being lesser than men behind the wheel, while other women are out there trying to prove the exact opposite, is the idea that her regressive comments are newsworthy.

A Google search of “Carmen Jorda” leads to of news results about this one set of comments, in English, German, Hungarian, Portuguese, Dutch, Italian, French, Spanish, Czech and more—all within the past day. A Google search of “Pippa Mann” brings up : A story that covered the IndyCar driver’s , in which she refuted Jorda’s claims by saying women succeed in IndyCar with no power steering and that she stands by the idea that women can “compete as equals in this sport.”

While a Google search doesn’t provide exact numerical data of how much a topic gets covered in the news, it’s clear that one woman’s opinion—a woman whose opinion is constantly rejected by other women in the sport—sets a bigger fire than the opinions of others: A female Indy 500 qualifier gets one hit on Google with her response to Jorda, while the exasperated responses of other women like and Le Mans engineer are nowhere to be seen.

When it comes to talking about diversifying a sport or any field, one person’s opinion shouldn’t be covered exponentially more than the opinion of others in that same demographic. That’s particularly true of a person like Jorda, whose comments do more to hurt the potential of women in racing than they do to help. There are plenty of successful women who express concerns about Jorda’s comments publicly, and plenty who agree, yet Jorda often gets the spotlight.

Women, or any other underrepresented demographic in a field, shouldn’t be boiled down to the few women people can name. Not every young girl is the “,” just like Patrick is her . Not every female racer agrees with Jorda, and that’s a nice way of saying it, yet she’s one of those names that’s easy to tack onto a story and run with.

While it’s preferential as a woman to brush Jorda’s comments aside and move on, that can’t happen until others realize that women in general can’t be put in categories. It’s time to learn that there are plenty of successful women who participate in motorsports, and media outlets don’t have to keep going back to the women whose names they can remember for quotes.

Until outlets can learn to look harder—to ask Gade, Mann, Nielsen, Simona de Silvestro,Jennifer Jo Cobb, Susie Wolff, Claire Williams, Ashley Freiberg, Gosia Rdest, Brehanna Daniels, or countless other women in motorsports how they feel about the issue, or to treat their comments about women in racing (or any other issue) as just as important and newsworthy as Jorda’s, we’re stuck in this absurd, damaging loop that keeps certain people and opinions in the spotlight.

And, like Jorda, none of those women can speak for every woman, every time. Inclusiveness is a conversation, not a monologue. If every empowering, positive quote from every woman—even those with , like Jorda’s—made the news like Jorda’s comments do, we’d have a lot more coverage of women in motorsports.

But we don’t, because Jorda’s made her name an easy one to remember. And thus, the lazy cycle of publishing her views as some sort of revelation continues.

Jorda posted a statement about her comments on Twitter, which is as follows:

Comments
Welcome to zzdcar comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
Racing
After Delivering 8 Seasons At The Back Of The Grid, Haas F1 Team Dumps Guenther Steiner
After Delivering 8 Seasons At The Back Of The Grid, Haas F1 Team Dumps Guenther Steiner
The partially North Carolina-based squad has determined that after , it needs to mix things up a little. The team’s firebrand has been following an abysmal 2023 season which saw the team score just four points-paying finishes. The team’s , where scored a fourth-place finish, but that season too...
Nov 16, 2025
Get Ready To Spend All Your Money On Retro Formula 1 Merch
Get Ready To Spend All Your Money On Retro Formula 1 Merch
Fellow nerds, get ready to open your wallets, because I’ve found what may be the greatest store of all time. With designs from Formula 1 teams like , you’re sure to find something that fits your particular nostalgic niche. I’d like to introduce you to Racing Retro. I first...
Nov 16, 2025
You've Probably Never Heard Of The Coolest Canadian Car Ever Built
You've Probably Never Heard Of The Coolest Canadian Car Ever Built
Name a car from the early 1960s built by a famed racing driver with curvy, lightweight aluminum bodywork, a big American engine, and a reputation for being unruly and fast as all hell. Your first thought was probably the famed Shelby Cobra, did you know there was a who...
Nov 16, 2025
Listen To In-Car Audio From Race Cars While You Work
Listen To In-Car Audio From Race Cars While You Work
If you follow racing in the U.S., you probably already know about the . Most of the episodes are too much of a distraction to put on as background noise while you work, but a couple of recent entries in his series have been working incredibly well for me....
Nov 16, 2025
Race Team Would Rather Create A Fake AI Woman Rather Than Hire A Real One
Race Team Would Rather Create A Fake AI Woman Rather Than Hire A Real One
In another unsurprising example of motorsport’s inhospitable mindset toward hiring competent women, the Racing team has announced a new partnership with Ava Rose, a literal , who will... engage with fans? Share knowledge about technology? “Navigate the cutting edge of innovation to create positive change” (whatever that means)? I...
Nov 16, 2025
Local Businesses Want Compensation After Allegedly Losing Money During Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix
Local Businesses Want Compensation After Allegedly Losing Money During Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix
If you listen to Formula 1 or local officials from Las Vegas and Clark County, you’d probably think November’s inaugural Las Vegas Grand Prix was a success. Some sources estimated that the city of Las Vegas made over $1 billion in revenue from the event — but there were...
Nov 16, 2025
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.zzdcar.com All Rights Reserved