Vicky Piria
Closed industries do not open because someone publishes a diversity statement. They open when a small number of people work inside them at the top level, deliver results, and rewrite what the next generation believes is possible. The hard question for any organisation trying to widen its talent base is not what to announce, but who to back, and what the working culture around them has to look like for the bet to pay off.
Vicky Piria is an Italian-British racing driver and Sky Sport Italia Formula 1 presenter who speaks on high-performance teamwork and breaking into male-dominated industries.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Vicky Piria
- She is the first woman to have raced in the GP3 Series and the only Italian woman in the W Series, two facts that make her a credible voice on what it actually takes to enter and survive a closed industry at the top level.
- She speaks from a current operating reality, not a retired career. She is racing in the 2025 Italian GT Sprint Championship in a Ferrari 296 Challenge while presenting Sky Sport Italia’s Formula 1 coverage.
- Her perspective on team performance is grounded in the specific mechanics of a motorsport team, where pit-crew coordination, driver feedback, and engineering decisions all run on tight feedback loops under time pressure.
- She works in two languages and across two cultures (Italian and British), useful for European audiences who want a speaker who reads the room beyond an Anglophone default.
- For automotive, motorsport, broadcasting, and brand-sponsorship audiences, she brings credibility from inside the sport rather than commentary from outside it.
Biography highlights
- First female driver in the GP3 Series, debuting with Trident Racing in 2012.
- Only Italian driver in the inaugural 2019 W Series, the Formula 1 feeder championship for women.
- Sky Sport Italia Formula 1 presenter from 2024, succeeding Federica Masolin.
- Italian GT Championship competitor; second in GT Cup in 2023 and three pole-to-win victories in the 2024 Endurance GT Cup Pro-Am Division 2.
- Confirmed driver for the 2025 Italian GT Sprint Championship with Scuderia Ghermandi by Zanasi Racing in a Ferrari 296 Challenge.
- Former Formula E commentator for Mediaset and presenter on Italia 1’s Drive Up automotive programme.
Biography
Motorsport is one of the most closed industries in professional sport. The cost of entry is high, the technical knowledge required is unforgiving, and for most of its history the cockpits and the commentary boxes have been occupied by men. Vicky Piria moved through both.
She arrived in the GP3 Series in 2012 as the first female driver in its history, racing for Trident. Seven years later she became the only Italian driver in the inaugural W Series, the Formula 1 feeder championship created to give female drivers a serious competitive pathway. Those two facts position her uniquely in European motorsport.
The current chapter is what makes her useful to organisations now. She races in the Italian GT Championship, taking three pole-to-win results in the 2024 Endurance GT Cup Pro-Am Division 2 and stepping into a Ferrari 296 Challenge with Scuderia Ghermandi by Zanasi Racing for the 2025 Sprint season. At the same time she fronts Formula 1 coverage on Sky Sport Italia, having replaced Federica Masolin in 2024.
She works comfortably in Italian and English, in front of a camera and inside a race team. For audiences in automotive, broadcasting, brand sponsorship, and any sector trying to widen its talent pipeline beyond the obvious candidates, that combination of operating credibility and broadcast craft is genuinely uncommon.
Key speaking topics
- Women in motorsport and male-dominated industries
- High-performance teamwork under time pressure
- Resilience in elite competitive environments
- Brand and sponsorship in motorsport
- Broadcasting, hosting, and panel moderation
- Career reinvention from athlete to broadcaster
Ideal for
- Automotive, motorsport, and mobility sector audiences (manufacturers, sponsors, dealer networks).
- Brand and marketing leadership at organisations sponsoring sport or building presence around motorsport.
- Diversity, inclusion, and talent leads in technical or engineering-led organisations.
- Event hosts seeking a bilingual (Italian and English) moderator with motorsport authority.
Audience outcomes
- A first-person account of what it took to enter and compete in the most male-dominated tier of professional sport.
- A working view of team performance inside a motorsport operation, from driver and crew dynamics to engineering feedback loops.
- A perspective on the W Series experiment, why it mattered, what it achieved, and what its absence now means for the pipeline.
- A motorsport-literate voice for sponsorship, brand activation, and event audiences who want substance behind the storytelling.