F1 Academy driver Chloe Chong shares the advice Lewis Hamilton gave her: 'I get goosebumps thinking about it'

Yahoo

5 days ago

F1 Academy driver Chloe Chong is thinking about her next moves — both on and off the racetrack.
The British-Canadian teenager was just 16 during the inaugural F1 Academy season in 2023. Today, at age 18, Chong is still learning how to balance life as a teenager with that of a high-performance athlete.
"There's one part of your life where you're an athlete and you're very focused" on training, media commitments, sponsorship deals, as well as your sport, Chong told Yahoo Canada. But "there's another side of yourself that is just a normal teenager."
"A lot of athletes sometimes feel limited by their sport, that competitive side of their life," she said. "They feel like if they take time to do stuff they really want to do, it shows that they're not trying enough, or they're not working hard enough.
"For me, I've realized that working hard is one part, but I also need to be able to do the things I want to do and not get overly invested in my sport." If you get overly invested, you try too hard. And if you fall out of love with it, "it all goes downhill."
Racing in the #27 Charlotte Tilbury car operated by Rodin Motorsport, Chong is still very much invested — and in love — with racing.
When you're in the thick of it, when you're competing against some of the best and fastest drivers out there, "the whole world slows down," she said. "You don't think about anything except your feelings in the car. That's what keeps me going."
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F1 Academy is an all-female racing series launched in 2023 by Formula 1 to develop and promote young female drivers in the motorsport industry. The Formula 4-level racing series recently partnered with Netflix for a new docuseries, F1: The Academy, which shines a light on one of the world's most demanding sports.
Chong, who is nicknamed "Miss Second Place" among her peers, said it was fellow driver Lewis Hamilton who told her "don't let anyone tell you no."
"He said, 'nothing's easy. Nothing good comes easily,' which applies to my journey into racing," Chong told Yahoo Canada. So far, in the 2025 season, with eight races behind her, she is sitting in 11th place with 11 points.
His advice "taught me to keep tenacity and keep looking forward and not look back at the mistakes I've made, because everyone makes the same mistakes." Hamilton, who competes in Formula One for Ferrari, "was so inspiring to me," she said. "I get goosebumps thinking about it."
Still in the early stages of her F1 Academy racing career, Chong said the nickname motivates her to work hard and push herself to "always do better."
"Every driver in the championship that I'm racing in will not accept second place as a victory," she said. You always want P1 [first place]. You want world records. You want something above what you've already got. And that's what keeps the sport very interesting, because you're always looking for more."
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