The Inspiring Motorsport Journey of Megan Bruce

It’s 35 degrees in Singapore, and the air feels like someone’s holding a hairdryer to your face. The tarmac shimmers. The humidity clings to everything — helmets, gloves, nerves. Somewhere behind the grandstands, Formula 1 engines rumble in the distance, and on the F1 Academy grid, Megan Bruce tightens her belts and tells herself not to overthink it.

Her car had broken down fifteen minutes before the end of practice. She’s never raced outside the UK. She’s had no time to learn the circuit, no time to adjust to the heat, and was only told a week earlier she’d be here at all. “Just keep it on the black stuff", she mutters through her visor.

The lights come on. Then off. And somewhere in the roar and haze of Marina Bay, a young woman from West Sussex launches into her first international race.

Rewind to lockdown 2020. Megan’s at home with her dad — Andy, a lifelong car nut — and the TV’s showing Jamie Chadwick making history. “I just thought, that’s cool", she laughs. “It hadn’t even crossed my mind that racing could be a real career".

Until then, life was about schoolwork, sport, and family. She was at Hurstpierpoint College, a proper independent school where commitment and discipline weren’t optional. Hockey was her thing — fast, competitive, and occasionally brutal. But skiing had always been in her blood. She’d been on the slopes since she was three.

“Skiing teaches you a lot about fear", she says. “You get used to moving quickly and trusting yourself". By her teens, she was racing on snow — and unknowingly training for life at 140 mph.

The crossover between skiing and racing is clear. Both punish hesitation. Both reward balance, instinct, and the ability to look ahead rather than down. “Skiing’s second nature now", she shrugs. “But I do sometimes think about injuries. If I break something, I can’t race — and racing’s my career now".

That word — career — arrived late in the story. Megan didn’t grow up dreaming of Formula 1. She was studying engineering at university, the practical type who likes to build things and figure out how they work. But before she even started university, she and her dad began building a Caterham 7 — a project that would change everything.

“I wanted to understand the car, not just drive it", she says. “So Dad and I decided to enter it into the Caterham Academy once it was finished”. Somewhere between the smell of oil and the sound of ratchets, the idea of racing stopped being a curiosity and started to feel like a calling.

Engineered to Race

By the time most people start university, they’re thinking about dissertations or deadlines.

Megan Bruce was thinking about building a car. The Caterham project came first — a father-daughter challenge that sparked something bigger. Her engineering course later gave her the tools to understand what she’d already begun to love — the science behind speed.

Her dad, Andy, was instantly on board. The garage became their shared space — tools on the floor, torque wrenches on the bench, the smell of oil and ambition in the air. Piece by piece, the car took shape. The moment it was finished, racing it just made sense. The Caterham Academy was calling, and Megan didn’t need convincing. It wasn’t about ticking boxes anymore — it was about seeing what the car, and she, could do.

That season came in 2023. Her first competitive outing was the Caterham Academy’s novice sprint at Curborough. The car was barely finished. She turned up with two days’ practice and a helmet that still smelled new.

Then came Cadwell Park — her first proper race. Tight, technical, and totally unforgiving. She qualified 11th, finished 10th, and went home with the realisation that she might actually be good at this.

By round three, she was qualifying on the second row. She even found herself in P2 for a few laps before spinning while defending. “I was furious", she admits. “Then I thought, hang on, I’m actually fighting for podiums!”.

That season gave her belief. The mix of skiing balance, hockey grit and engineering logic came together in a car she’d helped build. She started analysing data, adjusting setup, and working on her fitness. Suddenly, this wasn’t a fun project. It was a path.

In 2024, she moved up to the Caterham 270R — two steps above the Academy — while also starting her first GB4 season with Fox Motorsport. It was her first taste of single-seaters, and a steep learning curve.

By 2025, she joined KMR Racing for her second GB4 season, and everything began to click. “KMR have been amazing", she says. “They’ve helped me develop so much technically and mentally". This was the year she made real progress — the one that got her noticed by F1 Academy.

After a year balancing studies and racing, she chose to dedicate herself fully to motorsport. It was never about leaving something behind, but about moving toward to where she was meant to be.

The Need to Go Faster

Going faster turned out to be a bigger job than either of them imagined. The step from Caterham racing to Formula 4 isn’t so much a jump as a teleport. You go from a front-engined, road-based car with the aerodynamics of a garden shed to a purpose-built single-seater with wings, slicks, and a data system that knows more about your mistakes than you do.

“The first time I drove one", Megan says, “I thought something was broken. The steering felt heavy, the brakes tried to throw me through the windscreen, and the G-forces… I’d never felt anything like it”.

But she adapted quickly. Her engineering mindset was an advantage. She wanted to understand every feeling through the wheel — why the rear snapped, why the front washed wide, why aero grip comes and goes depending on throttle position. While others panicked, she analysed.

Still, she knew physical strength would make or break her season. “You can’t push a car if you can’t hang on to it", she says. So she built a programme around six key sessions a week: two chest days, two back days, one shoulder day, one leg day. Plus cardio, simulator work, and endless training in the gym. “It’s not about looking strong, it’s about being able to wrestle the car at the end of a thirty-minute race”. Her diet changed, too. “Everyone assumes racing drivers have to stay tiny", she laughs, “but I had to put on weight to build muscle”.

When she wasn’t in the gym, she was in the sim. She used it to learn new circuits, replay data, and break down every corner until it became instinct. That focus carried her through the GB4 season with KMR Racing — consistent, measured, and quick.

It was those performances that led to the message that changed everything: F1 Academy were putting together their Singapore grid, and they wanted Megan. “I honestly thought it was a prank", she says. “You don’t apply for F1 Academy — they pick you. I didn’t even have time to think. I just said yes”. A week later, she was on a plane halfway across the world — her first international race, new car, new pressure, and a climate that felt like racing inside a kettle.

Heat, Rain and Hard Lessons

The heat hits you first. It’s not air — it’s soup. Heavy, wet, and humming with noise. Singapore in September feels like someone’s turned the planet’s thermostat up and thrown away the manual. Megan stands beside her F1 Academy car, helmet under one arm, surrounded by steam and sound. She’s had almost no time to prepare. Her car broke down fifteen minutes before the end of practice, leaving her with barely a feel for the track.

So qualifying becomes practice. Practice becomes survival. When the lights go green, she rolls onto Marina Bay’s slick street circuit for the first time. A canyon of floodlights, barriers, and heat haze. “It’s so bright you forget it’s night", she says. Lap after lap, she finds rhythm and confidence. She qualifies fifteenth out of eighteen — modest on paper, remarkable in context.

Race one starts in suffocating heat. Thirty minutes of noise, sweat, and survival. She nails the launch, threads through traffic, and finishes higher than she started. A clean race, no mistakes, no damage. It’s a small victory, but a meaningful one.

Race two is different. The rain arrives. Water turns the circuit into a mirror. She channels her Caterham instincts — delicate inputs, smooth steering, throttle like a paintbrush. She climbs two places, but then the team calls her in: “Box now, rain’s getting worse”. Her gut says stay out. But it’s her first F1 Academy weekend. She doesn’t want to ignore instructions. She pits. The track dries. “Next time", she laughs, “I’ll argue".

When she finally climbs out, drenched and drained, she’s still smiling. “It was brutal. I’ve never sweated so much in my life”. Back at the hotel, she drops her gloves, leans against the wall, and thinks: Didn’t crash. Still alive. Car needs air conditioning. It’s the perfect summary of her first taste of global motorsport — heat, rain, chaos, and lessons that only come the hard way.

Beyond the Grid

Back home, the rain feels different. Grey, familiar, comforting. After the chaos of Singapore, a damp morning at Knockhill feels almost like therapy. Megan grins as the car twitches through the bends, slick tyres skating across Scottish drizzle. “I love the wet", she says. “It feels like home".

That skill in the rain is no accident. The Caterham taught her to dance with grip, not fight it. F4 rewards that same precision. “Light cars, no traction control — it’s basically physics with an attitude", she laughs.

But beneath the laughter is focus. She trains six days a week. She studies data, learns new circuits, and builds her strength and patience in equal measure. This isn’t a side project anymore. It’s her job.

Ask her what drives her, and she doesn’t talk about fame or money. She talks about feeling every movement of the car, the trust between driver and machine, and the thrill of improvement. Racing, she says, is about control — over the car, the nerves, the noise.

The question everyone asks her is the same one I did: Will we ever see a woman in Formula 1 again? She doesn’t hesitate. “I hope so. It’s just a numbers game. If more girls start karting young, it’ll happen. It has to”.

And that’s what makes her story matter. Megan isn’t just racing for herself. She’s quietly shifting the picture for the next generation. Every time she climbs into that car, she’s showing a new group of young women what’s possible — that engineering, racing, and grit aren’t gendered — they’re learned.

Her idols are telling. The cars she’d pick for her dream garage aren’t polished showpieces; they’re raw, mechanical beasts — a Porsche 930 Turbo and a Ferrari F40. “I like things with character", she smiles. “Perfect’s boring”.

Spend five minutes with her and you’ll see what makes her stand out. She’s warm, quick-witted, and disarmingly honest. She talks about mistakes with the same enthusiasm as victories. She’s a reminder that talent without ego is still the best kind.

Megan’s journey from a university workshop to the F1 Academy grid isn’t luck. It’s proof that curiosity, courage, and a supportive dad with a spanner can take you a long way. She’s one of those people who make you proud to be British — not because she’s loud about it, but because she just gets on with it.

If this is the future of women in motorsport, it’s in very good hands.

Written by: Paul Pearce