Motorsport: 'Impossible dream' comes true for Kiwi driver Emma Gilmour

Kiwi driver Emma Gilmour, right, with McLaren lead engineer Leena Gade. Photo / Getty

This week revealed the great news there will be once again a New Zealander sitting behind the steering wheel of a McLaren race car. While Emma Gilmour's race car will not quite be the iconic Formula One car, she is nonetheless now an official McLaren racing car driver.

McLaren are to contest the 2022 Extreme E series (fully electric off-road rally-esque cars) and Gilmour is set to be partnered with American Tanner Foust. She has already had a taste of the 2021 championship as the reserve driver for Veloce Racing alongside Stephane Sarrazin.

"It feels very surreal. To first be talking to the McLaren Formula One team was one thing, and then to become a McLaren driver was even more amazing," Gilmour told the Weekend Herald from England.

"I've always been very proud of the McLaren connection with [fellow Kiwi] Bruce McLaren starting the team, but being a rally a rally driver I never thought I'd be an actual part of the team.

"It's a dream that I thought would never be possible, but now it's come true.

"I got an email from Zak [Brown, McLaren Racing chief executive] saying to give him a call. At first I thought it was one of those spam-type emails where you have to ring someone to get some sort of inheritance.

"When I looked further into it I realised it was real, so I called. They're an amazing company to work with and work for. I'm just so proud to be part of it.

"Obviously I had heard that McLaren were coming into Extreme E. I had a few other approaches from other teams for next season, but to have the opportunity to drive for McLaren was a very big drawcard."

Gilmour is one of New Zealand's best rally drivers having finished runner-up in the New Zealand Rally Championships three times in a row — 2010, 2011, 2012. She was the first women to win a round of the NZRC, runner-up in the Asia Pacific Rally Championship, and won the FIA Women in Motorsport and Qatar Motor and Motorcycle Federation cross country rally event.

"I've been very thankful to Veloce for the opportunity to race part-time in the series this year. I was supposed to race full-time, but it didn't happen and fortunately Veloce made it possible for me to race and now this has happened.

"I've been very luck through my career that I've been able to do various sorts of things in motorsport. Rallycross in America was a big one and also learning how to race in the sand in Qatar is a great benefit.

"I've got to race cross country, rallycross, rallying obviously and all these things cross over into Extreme E really well. And most recently racing in the Cambrian Rally, which was very cool.

"I'm still contracted to Veloce until the end of the year and while it hasn't been confirmed yet, I'm pretty sure I'll be racing at the last round of this year's series at Bovington in the UK."

The series has a gender-neutral aspect where all the teams have a female and male driver who swap duties during each race. Gilmour's teammate Foust is no slouch and has plenty of experience in all sorts of machinery.

"Tanner has a very good pedigree and I've raced against him before when I did the Global Rallycross series in America," Gilmour said.

"He's got lots of experience from being a stunt driver, a drifter, rallycross and other things. I think we'll be a really good team and we work well together having meet him in the past.

"It's also helpful we're a similar size, which will make it much easier during driver changes."

Gilmour has been stuck overseas for four months now, and has tried multiple times to get an MIQ spot. As well as being a rally driver, she also has a successful business in Dunedin.

"I've tried the MIQ lottery six times now and have had no success," she said. "It's pretty frustrating and disappointing not being to get back home, but I have a really good team looking after the business."