First woman riding local GP bikes crowdfunds her race
Nadieh Schoots is the first ever woman to be listed to race in the Macau Grand Prix’s motorcycle race main event. The news broke from the racer herself. Through her social media channels as well as her official website, she announced her participation for the first time in the event that will take place next month.
In a post on Instagram, the Dutch racer also said this possibility comes after 10 years of her first hearing about the local GP and dreaming of participating in the race she named “the coolest thing I’d ever seen.”
The 31-year-old will be the first woman to race in the Macau Motorcycle GP, although in 1997 Portugal’s Fernanda Ramos participated in the Super Challenge Race, a secondary race of the GP that included several kinds of motorcycles and different engine types.
Schoots also revealed that back in 2018 she had already been invited by the Macau Grand Prix Committee to join the event but, at that time, she had to decline the invitation due to an injury she had suffered.
“I’ve dreamed of racing the Macau GP ever since meeting Dutch road racer Branko Srdanov in 2012 when we both competed in IDM (Internationale Deutsche Motorradmeisterschaft – German International Motorcycle Championship)… actually, at the time I did not believe it was something I could or would ever do, I simply thought it was the coolest race I’d ever seen. Yet a decade and a lot of blood, sweat and tears later, here we are. Not only do I make my debut, but I’ll also be the first woman to ever race a motorcycle in Macau. I’m incredibly excited, and hope to inspire more women to follow in my footsteps,” the racer said in a statement.
As the invitation to the event this year came very late, the racer is currently attempting to find sponsorships to be able to race in Macau and to balance her and her mechanics’ finances. Since Schoots is an amateur racer, the trip to Macau, including quarantine on entry, represents at least three weeks away from home and her daily job with the consequent loss of wages. She noted her team had established the crowdfunding project at gofundme.com to assist with the finances.
With this campaign, she hopes to collect some GBP8,000 (MOP73,308) that she claims to need to cover both her losses as well as funding her two mechanics Jödie Griffin and Sophie McGinn.
As of Monday evening, the crowdfunding project had 32 donations that reached GBP1,890 (MOP17,318), a figure campaign organizer Griffin said almost covers the wages that will be lost during the trip, but not the costs related to the racing event itself, i.e., tires, consumables, tools, spare parts and flight cases, among others.
According to the racer’s record, this year Schoots participated in four different races including the two hours of Zolder (Belgium), the North West 200 (Northern Ireland), the Horice 300 ZGH (Czech Republic), and the 24 Hour of Catalunya (Spain).
Schoots also has the title of the first woman to ever qualify for a Superbike race in the NW200 (2018) under her belt, and holds the Fastest Female record at the same event, beating the previous record by 11 seconds.
