UP CLOSE Accelerating to Greatness

Get to know the up and rising motorsports racing driver Bianca Bustamante as she encourages young women to pursue their dreams

- Kristina Isabel Oviedo

Before Bianca Bustamante graciously sped her way through the tracks as the first Filipina motorsport star to join the W Series last year, and sign with PREMA for the Formula 4 UAE Championship this 2023—she was, like many others, a young girl with a big dream just like any other. Her father was a previous race car driver which made the love for motorsports profound in their family; in fact, the minute she was born, she was already introduced to the sport and grew up on the tracks. When Bustamante was three years old, she already had her first car. And by the time she was six, she was already competing.

“It really is such a dream. Racing is an expensive sport and since I come from a middle-class family in the Philippines, I thought none of it would ever be possible for me. My parents had to work very hard, and racing wasn’t really a priority for our family, which taught me to think of every opportunity I get to be hard earned. I couldn’t take anything for granted. Financially, it was so difficult, that’s why I said it’s a dream come true for me,” recalls Bustamante on how her passion turned into a career.