From horses to horsepower - Lloyd dreaming of F1

Ella Lloyd is currently third in her rookie season in the F1 Academy

She is a former showjumper who swapped horses for horsepower.

Since starting motorsport four years ago, Ella Lloyd is already making her mark - and ruffling some feathers.

"The males don't like to get overtaken by females - you can tell that from their driving," the 20-year-old said. "They're a bit more aggressive, but I give it back to them and they stop.

"I want to beat the boys. I want to beat the girls. I want to be first."

Pontypridd-born Lloyd wants to take on everyone when it comes to the mixed-field F4 British Championship but she also has her eyes on success in the F1 Academy.

The Formula 4-level women's-only competition is designed to give young women in motorsport a direct pathway into the higher levels of single-seater racing.

Lloyd currently sits third in the F1 Academy standings - the best of any British driver - with only one race to go.

She has achieved five podium finishes, including a race victory in Jeddah and is hoping to finish her first full season in the Academy in style, at Las Vegas in November.

"I'm feeling pretty confident. It's a new track for myself, the team and the whole grid, so it's going to be a massive learning curve going into the race weekend," Lloyd said.

Quick changes of direction are familiar to the Welsh driver.

A former showjumper and skier, Lloyd only started motorsport at 16 and not via the typical karting route a lot of her peers used.

"There's always going to be disadvantages to not doing karting when you first start off - I had a lack of racecraft and knowledge about the driving side," she said.

"But I'm in my fourth year now and I've learned as much as possible so I think I'm quite even to most drivers.

"[In showjumping] you've got to have a feel for your animal, in skiing you've got to have a feel of what's underneath and that transfers well because you've got to have a good feel of what's happening with the car and what the car is doing."

Lloyd is one of only two female drivers having to juggle the F1 Academy with the mixed-field F4 British Championship this season.

Sharing the track with male drivers at this level is not something that worries Lloyd at all, despite the "mixed views" some peers have.

"I think you've just got to put your stamp down and get your elbows out a little bit and be like, yeah, I'm here to do the same thing as you are, and I'm not going to get pushed about.

"I'm just as tough as you are, so you've kind of got to put them back in their place and put them in their box, and they're all right then.

"At the end of the day we're all in equal machinery, we're all in cars that do the same thing. So it doesn't really make a difference to me whether I'm racing against females or a mixed grid."

Lloyd hopes she and the other racers in the F1 Academy can pave the way for a new generation of girls to see motorsport as a career - and not just on the track.

"There's a lot more females participating in the karting races and coming up through the ranks, which is nice to see," she said.

"Since I've started there's been quite a lot of females coming into the sport and not just drivers - mechanics and engineers. It's great to see."

Road to F1?

Lloyd has been announced as an Envision Racing test driver for Formula E's Women's Test day in Valencia on Friday, 31 October, where she will be at the wheel of the current GEN3 Evo race car, which accelerates at a rate 30% faster than those used in Formula 1.

But the goal is clear for the 20-year-old.

She became the only female driver in the McLaren driver development programme last year, and is hoping to follow in the footsteps of seven-time Formula 1 world champion Lewis Hamilton and current McLaren driver Lando Norris, who both graduated through the programme.

"My end goal is to keep progressing up the ladder, and obviously to get to F1 one day."

If Lloyd was to race in Formula 1 she could become the first female driver to enter a grand prix since Italian racer Giovanna Amati in 1992.

To get there she would most likely have to take the next step to Formula 3 - and judging from her current trajectory that may happen sooner rather than later.