Women Spotlight Wednesday - Zoe Florescu Potolea
- Silvia Cojocaru
- 2 hours ago
- 4 min read
Women have played an influential role throughout the history of motor racing. Many have taken to the wheels of motorsport machines, while numerous figures have worked tirelessly on the sidelines in various roles, shaping the motor racing world to the present day.
Woman Spotlight Wednesday aims to take a look at the tales of these superwomen, who have surpassed various hurdles to reach where they are today. In this article, we highlight one of motorsport’s rising stars, 17-year-old Zoe Florescu Potolea, currently racing in the F4 Spanish Championship.
Lighting the flame
Born on 23rd December 2008, Florescu’s love for racing was sparked at the age of seven, when she attended a karting camp in Italy. She continued going for two more years until the organiser, famous Romanian Karting rider Constantin Raileanu, suggested she should start racing professionally.
She made her official racing debut in 2018 in the final stage of the Romanian Karting Masters.
Florescu described her first proper race vividly: “It was one of those races, very eventful, lots of drama, crashes, broken equipment, mechanics rushing to fix everything before the next session, me falling to my knees trying to pull my kart out of the gravel, but never giving up and doing everything possible to race to the checkered flag.”
Despite all the chaos, she believed racing was the only thing she wanted to pursue, moving ahead in the future.
She continued taking part in the Romanian Karting Masters, finishing fourth in 2021, also joining European competitions such as the WSK Euro Series and the Rok Cup Superfinal.
Breaking boundaries
Florescu was crowned the winner of FIA Girls on Track - Rising Stars in 2022, gaining the support of the FIA Women on Track and the Ferrari Driver Academy in the OK category. The Iron Dames and Michelle Gatting also assisted her for some of her races at that time.
She had a tough year, encountering numerous engine issues, but she still showed sparks of talent.
For the following year, Florescu returned to Birel Art Racing, but decided to move to the shifter category, KZ2. When asked about her time in karting, she remarked that there weren’t many girls competing at the highest level in karting and added:
“I think girls need to regard the FIA karting categories more seriously; if you want to equally compete with the boys, you have to go where the hardest and toughest boys are, in the hardest and toughest categories.
“Otherwise you are fooling yourselves and, in all honesty, serious racers will know that you are not prepared at the highest level, and will already have an advantage over you.”
She wrapped up her 2025 season with one podium in Italy, and she reached the global rank of 29 in the FIA International Karting Ranking, being the only female driver in the KZ2 shifter category at the time.
Also in 2025, Florescu took part in the F1 Academy Rookie Test in Navarra, finishing eighth in the morning session and 10th in the afternoon session out of 18 rookie female drivers.
Facing hardships
Florescu faced many difficulties in her path to becoming a professional racer. Firstly, having to compete against boys her entire career, she noticed that many of them had a different attitude when racing against her, especially when she was younger.
She stated that they would often prefer crashing into her when she would try to overtake them, instead of admitting that she was simply faster.
Unfortunately, kids weren’t the only ones indulging in such practices. Florescu recollected being told by other parents on being “a good racer, for a girl”, or make fun of boys for “losing to a girl”.
Whether they understood the stereotypes they were reinforcing or not, having young people exposed to this mentality makes it harder for women to break into a field they don’t feel welcome in in the first place.
Another hardship Florescu remains open about is that becoming competitive in professional racing requires sacrifices.
She laid down certain steps one must follow in order to reach the highest level internationally, with some steps along the way harder to accomplish for nations such as Romania, which tend to have limited motorsport presence. For this reason, Florescu gained her international licence in Italy when she first started her professional career.
Continuing the story
At the start of this year, Florescu made the change from karts to cars, entering her first Formula Winter Series race as part of the Campos Racing team.
Her debut in the category was exceptional, claiming a double female podium and winning the Best Female Driver award in the process.
Florescu recently announced that she would be competing in the F4 Spanish Championship for the 2026 season, joining the Tecnicar Racing team as part of the Campos Academy.
The young Romanian reached another historic milestone in her career. At just 17, she became the first Romanian female driver to compete in the prestigious F1 Academy as a wildcard entry in Zandvoort. She managed an outstanding result in qualifying that would’ve had her start from the first row of the reverse grid race.
Unfortunately, her amazing result was overturned through no fault of her own, after her car was found to be in breach of the Technical Regulations. This meant that Florescu had to start the reverse grid race from P17 and the main race from P18.
Despite the setback, Florescu put in an impressive performance on Saturday’s race, managing to avoid Natalia Granada after her crash on Lap 2, climbing up to 12th. She was promoted to 11th after Emma Felbermayr’s post-race penalty.
Her incredible efforts earned her a well-deserved spot in the upcoming F1 Academy rookie test in September, backed by McLaren.
With this opportunity, Florescu is closer to the highest level of racing. She believes in a future where women get to compete against men at the highest level, in Formula One, and her performances could make this a reality for her.
Keep your eyes on the young Romanian driver, as she is determined to become one of the next big stars of motorsport!
Edited by Vyas Ponnuri
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