SOPHIA FLORSCH has revealed she returned to racing after her horror 172mph smash to prove women are tough enough for the sport.
The German speedster, 19, broke her spine after flying off the track at 170mph at Formula Three’s Macau Grand Prix.
Florsch cheated death when she smashed her F3 car into a photographer’s platform in a horror crash, injuring herself and four others just 18 months ago.
She miraculously survived the ordeal but fractured her seventh vertebra in the accident and was rushed to hospital for an 11-hour operation to ensure she wasn’t paralysed for life.
The crash surviver was already back on the wheel just 105 days after breaking her spine and even made an emotional return to the scene of her dramatic smash at the 66th Macau Grand Prix a year on.
View this post on InstagramMacau 2019
——— Everything was planned just three weeks before the Grand Prix. Everything was organised really shortly but with the help of my two main partners @mgm.mo and @ixo_models it was possible for me to go back to Macau this year.
I always said from the beginning onwards that my main goal is to enjoy it and prepare for next season as the @fiaf3 car was completely new to me. Apart from that I of course loved it to be driving through the streets of Macau again!
Thanks to @hwaag_official for that great work during those days. Shame that we had a technical failure in the Grand Prix but that’s Motorsport
. Congrats to @richardverschoor for taking the win this year.
||
x @birgarolsen || Anzeige #sophia #sophia99 #racegirl #changeagent #racing #macau #push #limit #comeback #MGMMacau #MGMCotai #MGM #ixo #ixomodels
A post shared by Sophia
(@sophiafloersch) on
Now reflecting on the horrific ordeal, Florsch reveals she was driven to make a speedy return to the cockpit to prove women are tough enough for motorsport.
She told The Telegraph: “If I had said no, that I wasn’t going to come back, many people would have blamed it on me being a woman,
“‘Oh, she’s not tough enough,’ they would have said. ‘Typical girl.’ That would have hurt not just me, but also the role of women in motorsport.
“There are still many who don’t trust a woman to be as fast as a man, or to be as tough or as stubborn. That’s what we are fighting against and trying to prove.
“It gets better, but you don’t change some minds from one day to the next. I feel that people treat me with more respect now.”
The teen’s dad revealed the agonising minutes he endured as he waited to see find out whether his daughter has survived the accident.
Florsch rose from the ruins of her crash to pick up the Laureus World Comeback of the Year award in February for her incredible story.
The youngster was set to be in Budapest for testing ahead of her maiden campaign in FIA Formula Three – a feeder series for F1 before the coronavirus crisis KO’d sport across the globe.
She has been working out and staying sharp as Germany slowly eases its strict lockdown measures brought in to tackle the killer virus.
But being cooped up in her home in Bavaria hasn’t dwindled her passion to prove that F1 isn’t just a sport for men.
She said: “The issue is that many years ago, F1 was a man’s world,
“It was hard racing and drivers were dying. People from the older generation still see the sport as it was then. But it has changed a lot.
“When I do a presentation now, I always show a video of Charles Leclerc at Suzuka, going through a right-hander at 155mph, with one hand on the steering wheel and the other adjusting his mirror.
“So, he can drive at that speed with one hand, but a woman cannot do it at all? I don’t think so.”
The teen – who has been racing since she was five – is being tipped for a bright future.
She has thrived at every level so far and will hope to continue her form in F3 to get a crack at the pinnacle of the sport in Formula One.
Source: Motorsport - thesun.co.uk
