Bianca Bustamante

 

Bianca Bustamante is a Filipina single-seater racer who began racing cars in 2022. 

She was selected for the third season of the all-female W Series and finished 14th overall, scoring a couple of points for the W Academy team. This followed some guest appearances in the 2022 USF Juniors championship and a spot in the FIA’s Girls on Track shootout in 2021. She did the first two meetings in USF Juniors with IGY6 Motorsport and had a best finish of tenth. 

Later in the 2022 season, she drove for the Bangalore Speedsters in the Indian Racing League and was 17th in the individual standings. The Speedsters were fifth out of six teams. 

Moving back to F4, she joined the Prema team for the 2023 UAE F4 series. Although she was usually a backmarker, she did manage a tenth and ninth place at Kuwait and Dubai. This was preparation for a season in the 2023 F1 Academy with Prema, another all-female championship using F4 cars. She won two races at Valencia and Monza. F1 Academy coverage shows her combative and determined driving style, although she also had some scares, including a collision with Chloe Grant’s flying car at Monza. She was seventh in the championship.

Her second part-season in USF Juniors gave her a pair of ninth places at Circuit of the Americas, driving for Exclusive Autosport. In a busy year, she also replaced Aurelia Nobels for one round of the Italian F4 championship, finishing 19th twice and 25th once at Spa.

For the 2024 season, she switched teams in F1 Academy, moving to ART. She was also chosen as McLaren's supported driver in the series, despite some controversy at Christmas over some tweets about Lance Stroll.

Before switching to cars, she raced karts with some success in the Philippines and the USA throughout her childhood. 

(Image copyright Vogue Philippines)