INDIANAPOLIS — Chip Ganassi Racing and PNC teamed up this IndyCar season for a new campaign to increase the ranks of women in motorsports.
Part of the campaign includes an internship program and the inaugural class is working trackside right now at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
In an industry where speed is king, one aspect of motorsports was historically slow to catch up: the presence of women, not just on the grid, but in the pits and in the garages, making sure these machines operate at peak performance.
"When I entered this business, I was the only one," said Anna Chatten, gearbox mechanic for Chip Ganassi Racing. "So I really just wanted to kind of blend in back then."
"I was watching a race on TV once with one of my friends and we were playing the game of like, 'Oh, spot the women.' And we could count probably on two hands," said Jennifer Short, a mechanical engineering major at Purdue University.
But the traditional boys club at the track is changing.
"There's a lot more female presence than there used to be 20 years ago, for sure," Chatten said.
A new program is driving even more gender equality in IndyCar.
Chip Ganassi Racing teamed up with PNC to launch paid internships for female college students, meant to create more opportunities for women as engineers, mechanics and athletic trainers.
Short and Rebecca Hutton from Purdue and IUPUI are two of the five interns selected for the season.
"It's honestly still surreal! I'm like, 'OK, somebody pinch me,'" said Hutton, a motorsports engineering major at IUPUI. "Then today, being able to be on the timing stand during practice, it's an amazing experience. It'll prepare me for my career for sure."
"Chip Ganassi's a great team and obviously PNC is amazing for sponsoring this program and this is the internship of my dreams," Short added. "We are learning how the data analysis on the cars work, getting tours around the shop and garages and the pits and I was out on the timing stand for practice and I was able to look over the shoulders of engineers and see what they were doing with data analysis."
The interns are also learning from women who already excel in the field, like Chatten, who has spent 22 years in the racing industry. She worked her way up the ranks and is now working full-time on Jimmie Johnson's No. 48 car, after taking a break to be mom to her two daughters.
Now, she's doing it all: a mom, a mechanic and a mentor to the next generation of women in motorsports.
"There's nothing in motorsports, gender-wise, that can hold you back by any means," Chatten said. "I'm super excited to be working here and have the opportunity to be a part of it and help see the shift happen."
That shift is important to Indy 500 pole sitter Scott Dixon, too, not only as a driver, but also as a dad to two daughters.
"Whether it's on the engineering front to the driving front to mechanics, gear boxes, you know, there's so many different areas that women, really...we need them to get involved in our sport, you know, to make it better and especially being a girl dad, that's a big inspiration," Dixon said.
This program hopes to inspire even more girls interested in racing to pursue their passion. Just like any career, if you see it, you believe you can do it. The women working as interns now want to set that example, as they launch their own future careers.
"Little girls want to be what they see other women being, that's true," Hutton said. "To have them see that they can be in this industry and that's an option for them is really important. For me? Being here these two days solidified it. This is it. This is where I'd like to be."
"Even when I'm at the track for 14 hours, I'll hear a car start at the end of the day and it still brings me this joy," Short said. "I'm helping make that work. I'm helping make this car fast and I'm a part of a team that's doing something great."
Chip Ganassi Racing has more information about the Women in Motorsports program on its website.