Lisa Clark

Lisa Clark is an American driver who has competed in the US Ferrari Challenge since 2017. She is known online as "Racer Mom".

Speed was a family thing when she was growing up; her father raced dirt bikes and the two used to ride together at night. Lisa always gravitated towards four wheels rather than two, and a payout she received after a motorcycle accident helped her to afford a Porsche, which she used for autocross. There was a long gap while she was having her children, but she never gave up on her plan. She found out about the Ferrari Corsa Pilota training programme when she bought her first road-going Ferrari, then realised that she could also race the car competitively. Preparation consisted of karting and some arrive-and-drive endurance races in Europe, then she was ready to go.

In her first season, she did just two races, at Bowmanville in Canada. She finished both, in tenth place. The following year, she did five of the championship's eight races, finishing in the top ten in three of them. The best of these was a sixth place at Watkins Glen. She was eleventh in the championship.

She secured her first trophy in 2019, coming home first in the Am class of the North American Challenge at Sebring. This was one of five podiums that season, on her way to sixth place.

She also raced in Europe, entering the Le Mans round of the European Ferrari Challenge, although she did not finish. The World Final at Mugello gave her a tenth place.

Her 2020 campaign was a part-season. She did just over two-thirds of the meetings and her best one was the away round at Misano, where she won the Am class twice. She was sixth in the World Final at Misano.

In 2021, she scored her first overall podium, a third at Homestead-Miami. After a stronger season, she was sixth in the championship. In Europe, she raced in the Ferrari Coppa Shell at Valencia and the Nurburgring, with a best finish of ninth at the Nurburgring.

She also did her first major race outside the Ferrari Challenge, and not in a Ferrari. Driving an Audi R8 LMS GT4 with Jeff Westphal, Martin Lechman and Mark Issa, she was third in class in the Barcelona 24H, 24th overall.

2022 was one of her best seasons yet, with three podium finishes in the Am class on her way to a class third overall in the Coppa Shell North America. She also raced in Europe at Portimao and Paul Ricard, scoring points in the Coppa Shell Europe.

In 2023, she was 15th in the championship and eleventh in the World Final. However, this was just gearing up for a busy year in 2024, with another full Ferrari Challenge season and some extras. She took part in the FIA Motorsport Games in the single-make GT section, finishing eleventh, and also raced her Ferrari in Europe in two rounds of the 24h Series. This was with the Pellin team who ran her in the Coppa Shell Europe, sharing a GT3 Ferrari 488 with Jeff Westphal and Kyle Marcelli. They were tenth and ninth in class in the two Mugello 12 Hour races. They were twelfth and 17th overall.

Another season split between the Ferrari Challenge and the 24H Series in Europe beckoned in 2025. She used the same Ferrari 296 for both.

Image copyright 24H Series

Her car is run by Ferrari of Beverly Hills in the American championship.

Barbara Johansson

Barbara Johansson was a Swedish race and rally driver most active in the 1960s. She usually drove small cars and is most associated with the Mini. She was nicknamed "Bra-Bra" by the Swedish press, with "bra" translating here as "good".

Barbara was born in the USA to Swedish parents, although she lived her entire adult life in Sweden. She had always been interested in cars and enjoyed driving fast in her parent's Ford V8 when going to and from the stables where she kept her horses. After her marriage, she began her motorsport career in speedboats, sharing a vessel with her husband. Her husband worked for a Peugeot dealership and it was at the suggestion of his boss that she tried out motor racing. She won her first event, driving a Peugeot 203.

She was highly successful in the Swedish Touring Car Championship and won a Group 2 race outright, at Knutstorp in 1964. Her car was a Mini Cooper run by the works BMC team. She was also second at Falkenberg and fourth at Skarpnack, and would have been Group 2 champion without a couple of non-finishes. According to a story, DKW driver Sigurd Isaakson said that if she beat him in a race, he would withdraw from the championship. She did defeat him in 1964, albeit in a different class, and he did go home.

Her first STCC appearance was in 1960, at Karlskoga, where she drove a Peugeot 403 and finished tenth, eight laps down. Sharing the same car with Jan Englund and Carl-Erik Linn, she was 21st in the end-of-season enduro at Skarpnack. 

In 1961, she appeared in the same race, driving a Renault Dauphine this time. Her co-drivers were Gunnar Friberg and Lars-Erik Tisell and they were 17th overall. This was as part of a Renault dealer team who were trying to gain attention by employing a female driver.

She then disappears from the STCC entry lists until 1964. She did two rounds of the championship in 1965, finishing one, at Karlskoga, in fifth place. Again, she was driving a Mini.

The 1966 STCC featured Barbara and her Mini racing in its mid-season events. She was tenth at Skarpnack, eighth at Karlskoga and twelfth at Falmarksbanen. After this, BMC began to scale back its motorsport activities and could no longer support her.

After touring cars, she also raced single-seaters. Photos exist of her competing in Formula Vee in 1967, although results are not readily available. Her car was a German-designed Dolling. By this time, she had separated from her husband and was combining her competition career with bringing up two children, helped by a nanny. She went back to racing boats, continuing to compete on and off until the early '70s.

Alongside her racing career, she competed in rallies. When BMC Sweden's representative Bosse Elmhorn saw her competing in local ice races and rallies, it was their rally team she was originally signed up for. Her team-mate was Harry Kallstrom, In a reflection of her track activitiy, she had already entered the Swedish Midnight Sun Rally in 1960, in a Peugeot 403, and the same event in 1961, in a works-supported Renault Gordini. She was also on the entry list for the Malarallyt.

In 1963, she was part of the BMC set-up. She was assigned a Mini Cooper for the Midnight Sun Rally, but then switched to an MG 1100 for three more Swedish events. At the end of the year, she did her first overseas rally, the RAC Rally in the UK, driving the Mini with Sheila Taylor. Sadly, the suspension failed when they were in fifth place.

A regular partnership with Margot Bradhe formed for 1964. Apparently, Margot was a calming influence on Barbara's aggressive driving style; she did not believe in lifting off the throttle. They drove the Mini Cooper almost exclusively and entered the Monte Carlo Rally for the first time, although they do not seem to have finished. Barbara's best finish was a 24th place in the Midnight Sun event, There were 138 finishers that year and many more starters. Later in the year, she won the Ladies' prize in the Jamt Rally.

Her last year as a rally driver was in 1965. BMC were already scaling back by then and she was back in a Renault 8 Gordini. She and Inga-Lill Edenring entered the Midnight Sun Rally, but do not appear to have finished.

She died in 2013, aged 80.

(For reference, Tommy Lyngborn's 2014 article provided a lot of the additional information here.)

Image copyright Upplands Museum, Sweden.

Liliana de Menna

Liliana de Menna was a stalwart of the Italian touring car scene who was active between 1963 and 1994. 

Her first efforts were in races for small-engined saloons, when she competed under the name of "Liliana" in the hope that she wouldn't worry her family. She had got into motorsport after visiting the Vallelunga circuit with friends who raced; throughout her career, Vallelunga would remain her favourite circuit. She had seen world karting champion Susy Raganelli testing with her father and decided to try it for herself.

She won a saloon championship in her first year of racing, winning nine races outright. Her car was a 600cc Fiat 500 Montecarlo. 

The following year she won Class 2 of the Coppa Carotti hillclimb. She did several hillclimbs during her career; the Italian touring car championship was a combination of hillclimbs and circuit races at the time. In 1968, she finished the Cesano-Sestriere climb, in the middle of a group of Giannini Fiat 500s, as well as winning her class in the Bolzano-Mendola event.

She was the Italian ladies' champion in 1968. Her marriage to Italo Cantera did not slow her down and the pair even raced together in the Vallelunga 2 Hours one year. 

Some time at the end of the '60s, she had a daughter and took a lengthy hiatus from motorsport. She stopped attending race meetings because she didn't enjoy them without being able to compete herself. It wasn't until the late '70s that she came back. According to her, Giancarlo Naddeo asked her to join the Renault 5 one-make series, and she agreed. She also raced in single-make series for the Fiat 127 and MG Metro. This was the car she shared with her husband.

One-make racing led back to the Italian Touring Car Championship in the 1980s. In 1989, she raced at Pergusa in a Renault 5, coming 11th. She was then tenth at Vallelunga. For the second Vallelunga round, she shared an Audi Europa-run VW Golf with Michele Rayneri, but did not finish. 

She even raced for Lella Lombardi's team in the Italian Supertouring series in 1991, using a Ford Escort for the Pergusa 2 Hour race. Her team-mate was Walter Santus and they finished 18th. Earlier in the season, she had raced a Toyota Corolla in the Trofeo Mario Angiolini at Monza. 

Later in her career, she raced sportscars, including a Nissan 300ZX in 1992, which she used for that year's Vallelunga 6 Hours. She and Francesco Ramacciotti were 2st overall. In 1994, she entered the Italian Supercar GT championship in a Mazda RX-7, driving solo.  She was disqualified from the first meeting at Monza, but won her class twice at the next round, held at Magione. Her overall results were a fifth and fourth place. The next race she appeared in was round 5, at Varano, but she could only manage one twelfth place.

She raced in America for the first time in 1999, more than 30 years after she made her debut, when she did some rounds of the all-female Women's Global GT series, driving a Panoz Esperante. Her programme consisted of two guest appearances. 

She died in 2021.

(Image from Il Messaggero)