Queanbeyan’s greatest motorsport racer Mark Webber may have retired but Beck Connell’s racing career is just getting up and running.
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The 23 year old is the state champion in the KA3 open category where she races, and beats, the male drivers.
On the weekend, a fast finishing Connell placed in the top ten at the national championships in Newcastle.
And she may have finished higher if she hadn’t got stuck behind a pile of karts after a crash.
She had the seventh fastest time in the last race of the weekend.
Connell will now set her sights on the world championships in France later in the year.
And she said she wants to focus on moving into racing cars sometime in the future.
"I would like to step it up and go to race cars at some point, whether it be next year or the year after,” Connell said.
She is part of an increasing number of females in the sport who are breaking down the gender barriers and taking on the men.
"It's actually growing a lot which is great to see,” Connell said. “Here in Australia when I was 12 to 15 there wasn't many younger girls racing but now I'm a little bit older I've seen so many people go into go-karting and even progressing to cars so it's awesome to see.”
"It's one of those sports where it's not female or male based, once you're on the track it doesn't matter what gender you are, you're all competing against each other and going for that same goal to get up the front.”
But Connell is quickly emerging as one of the best female drivers in Australia.
She was the only woman to win a state championship in Australia last year and she was the highest ranked female in her category at the Australian Kart Championships.
She was also awarded the Women of Australian Motorsport junior development scholarship for the 2016/2017 race season.
Connell is currently seeking sponsorship so she can save enough money to get her to Le Mans in France for the world championship in October.
She is aiming to raise $10,000 to $15,000 to get her and her kart over to Europe.