Motor racing: Juju Noda 1st Japanese woman to race at Super Formula c’ship

SUZUKA, Japan (Kyodo) — Juju Noda made her debut as the first Japanese female driver and the youngest ever to compete at the Super Formula national championship, the biggest stage in domestic auto racing, on Saturday.

The 18-year-old daughter of former Formula One driver Hideki Noda posted the slowest times in both free practice and qualifying at the Suzuka Circuit in Mie Prefecture.

But she remained optimistic, saying, “It was good to experience this. It’s natural that you hit a wall at first.”

Noda began to drive a racing cart at age 3 under the guidance of her father and trained in Europe after she turned 14.

“I’ll just put this behind me, take one race at a time and do whatever I can,” the TGM Grand Prix team driver said.