Occupation: S2000 Customer Sales Support - M-Sport Hobbies/Interests: Keeping fit, horse-riding, waterskiing, cooking Biggest Motorsport influence: Neal Bates. He has been my mentor right from the beginning Rally Debut: Rally of the Manning Valley 2005 Australian Rally Championship Debut: Coates Rally Queensland 2007 Championship Titles: 2010: British Ladies Rally Champion, 3rd Citroen Racing Trophy (BRC), IRDC Most Improved Award 2009: British Ladies Rally Champion, Greenlight TV Star Performer Award 2008: F16 Champion, Australian Rally Championship 2007: F16 Champion, Australian Rally Championship 2006: 2WD Champion, NSW Rally Championship 2006: 2 Litre Champion, NSW Rally Championship

Background:

Molly was born and bred in Sydney, and lived there most of her life, aside from four years at New England Girls’ Boarding School in northern NSW. This was where she focused on her equestrian interest, competing in national level eventing.

An interest in rallying was inevitable, given mum Coral’s involvement as four-time Australian Rally Champion co-driver to Neal Bates in the factory Toyota team. However, it wasn’t until she worked at her father Mark’s rally school in the holidays that Molly tried driving a rally car.

While still at school, a friend offered her a car to compete in some local motorkhanas. She finished ninth outright and first in class in her first event. The bug had bitten, so Molly decided to move home to Sydney to finish school and get seriously into motorsport.

As soon as she gained her rally licence she started competing in a Holden Gemini. In 2006 she was selected in the Women’s Driver Development Program run by the Confederation of Australian Motorsport (CAMS) and noted as a standout performer. She also made the difficult decision to sell her beloved horse, Banjo, to pay for a more powerful car to help advance her career.

Her first outing in the new car was the Rallye Des Femmes in Canberra, which she won by five full minutes. She went on to take the 2WD and 2-Litre titles in the 2006 NSW Rally Championship and was recognised as the NSW Young Achiever of the Year by CAMS, an award that covers all forms of motorsport.

In 2007, Molly made her debut in the Australian Rally Championship and won the F16 class. She repeated the feat the following year, as well as flying to the UK to contest a round of the British Rally Championship.

In 2009 Molly moved to the UK (she has dual citizenship) to compete in the Suzuki Swift Sport Cup, a one-make sub-series of the British Rally Championship.

She won three of the six events and looked certain to take the title in the last round when a mechanical problem ended her rally, and her title chances. She was consoled by becoming the British Ladies Rally Champion.

Last year she again contested the British series, this time in a Citroën C2 as part of the Citroën Racing Trophy, finishing third outright after three podiums across the season. She also began working at M-Sport with the customer sales team for the Ford Fiesta S2000, where she is still employed.

In October last year, with mum Coral in the co-driver’s seat, Molly competed in the Pirelli Star Driver Shootout against 15 other young rally drivers from around the world. She won one of six fully funded scholarships to contest the 2011 World Rally Championship as part of the FIA WRC Academy Cup.

It’s a specially tailored training program and one-make rally sub-series, which replaces the former Junior World Rally Championship format, and is aimed at developing young drivers and providing them with a passage through to the elite levels of the sport. All the drivers compete in equal Ford Fiesta R2s prepared by M-Sport, the team behind the BP Ford Abu Dhabi World Rally Team.

The WRC events which Molly will compete in are: Rally de Portugal (March), Rally d'Italia Sardegna (May), Rally Finland (July), Rally Deutschland (August), Rallye de France (September) and Wales Rally GB (November).

The FIA WRC Academy Cup rounds take place over two full days of the nominated WRC events. There will be training and tuition in the classroom and on the stages, as well as lectures, mentors, grades, homework – and tests! The tuition covers driving and co-driving performance as well as related topics including technical, health, lifestyle and media skills.