Michelle Gatting

Michelle Gatting is a Danish racing driver who made history as the first woman to win the Ferrari Challenge Europe Trofeo Pirelli Championship and was part of the first all-female team to win a FIA World Endurance Championship race. A Porsche factory driver and key member of the Iron Dames squad, she’s racked up over 200 races and 60+ podiums across multiple series—proving that persistence pays off, even when the funding doesn’t always flow freely.[1][2][3]

EARLY YEARS

Born December 31, 1993, Gatting is Danish through and through, though details about her childhood, family, and the specific corner of Denmark she hails from remain mysteriously scarce.[1][2][3] What we do know: she found her way to karting in 2006, around age 12 or 13, which is when most kids are still figuring out how to parallel park a bicycle.[2][6] No breadcrumb trail of parental influence, siblings cheering from the sidelines, or early mechanical obsessions has surfaced—just a girl, a kart, and what would become a very long, very determined road ahead.

OTHER INTERESTS

If Michelle Gatting has hobbies outside of strapping into race cars and logging triple-digit speeds, she’s keeping them under wraps. No pottery classes, no secret book clubs, no side hustles or charitable foundations have made it into the public record. Perhaps she’s too busy actually racing to cultivate a carefully curated off-track persona, or perhaps she just likes to keep her private life private. Either way, the woman is a racing-first kind of operator.[1][2][3][6][7]

EARLY SUCCESS

Gatting cut her teeth in German karting, where she became a two-time runner-up in the German Karting Championship—close, but not quite the top step.[3][6] In 2011, she made the leap to single-seaters with Formula Ford Denmark, finishing third in the championship.[1][2][6][7] It was a solid debut, the kind that suggests talent and grit, but it also marked the beginning of a frustrating pattern: financial difficulties kept her from climbing the ladder into the big international series that could have fast-tracked her career.[1][7] While other drivers with deeper pockets or better-connected sponsors moved up, Gatting stayed hungry, racing in whatever she could—Scirocco Cup Germany, Porsche Carrera Cup Germany, and a handful of other series that don’t exactly scream “glamour” but do scream “I’m not giving up.”[7]

By 2018, she’d found her footing in endurance racing, scoring second in the Gulf 12 Hours GT3 Pro-Am and third in Danish Superturismo Turbo.[2] Not headline-grabbing stuff, but steady, methodical progress—the kind that builds a résumé one podium at a time. Then came the Iron Dames.

NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENTS

• 2011: 3rd place, Formula Ford Denmark Championship.[1][2][6][7]
• 2018: 2nd place, Gulf 12 Hours – GT3 Pro-Am.[2]
• 2018: 3rd place, Danish Superturismo Turbo.[2]
• 2020/21: 9th overall, 24 Hours of Le Mans.[2]
• 2021: 1st place, Ferrari Challenge Europe Trofeo Pirelli Championship—the first woman ever to win the title. Clinched the championship on November 19, 2021, finishing fourth in the final race under safety car conditions. Post-race, she said, “I am over-the-moon at today’s result, we are the champions. I am super pleased with how the car and the team have performed throughout the whole season and I am of course humbled to be the first female driver to be champion of the series. I think this is a very important step for women in motorsport.”[1][2][3][4][6]
• 2022: Victory at the 4 Hours of Portimao, European Le Mans Series.[6]
• 2022: Victory at the Gold Cup’s 24 Hours of Spa.[6]
• 2023: Historic pole position at the 6 Hours of Monza with the Iron Dames. “We knew that the pace had been there the whole season to do it. We knew it was in the car,” she said.[7]
• November 2023: Victory at the 6 Hours of Bahrain, FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) LMGTE Am category—making history as part of the first all-female team to win a WEC race. Shared the Porsche 911 RSR-19 with Sarah Bovy and Rahel Frey.[1][2][3][5][6]
• 2023: 2nd overall in the WEC championship with the Iron Dames.[2]
• 2024: Victory at Imola, European Le Mans Series, with an all-female driver lineup.[5]
• December 2024: Named an official Porsche factory driver, effective 2025.[1][3][5]

INSPIRATIONS

If there’s a childhood hero who sparked Michelle Gatting’s racing dreams, or a mentor who guided her through the karting days, or even a favorite race that made her think, “Yes, this is what I want to do with my life,” she hasn’t shared it publicly. No interviews waxing poetic about Senna posters on the bedroom wall, no tributes to a racing-obsessed uncle or a coach who believed in her when no one else did. It’s entirely possible she’s just not the sentimental type, or maybe she’s simply too focused on the present to dwell on the past. Either way, the record is silent on who or what lit the fire—leaving us with only the results to speak for themselves.[1][2][3][6][7]

REPUTATION

Gatting has earned serious respect in the paddock, not just for breaking barriers but for actually being fast. Her consistency, pace, and racecraft speak louder than any headline about “first woman to…” though those headlines are entirely deserved. Iron Dames leader Deborah Mayer praised her directly after the 2021 Ferrari Challenge win, noting, “Michelle has driven impressively and consistently throughout the whole season.”[4] Industry chatter paints her as talented, determined, and—crucially—someone who gets better every year. She’s become a role model for young women eyeing motorsports, not because she talks a big game, but because she delivers results under pressure.[1][5]

Her role with the Iron Dames, an all-female endurance racing team, has amplified her influence. Since joining in 2020, she’s been a key figure in a project designed to create opportunities for women in a sport that has historically offered them very few. The team’s WEC win in Bahrain wasn’t just a feel-good story—it was a statement of capability. Media coverage has been overwhelmingly positive, focusing on the historic nature of her achievements while acknowledging the skill required to pull them off. No controversies, no drama, no feuds—just steady, relentless progress.[1][2][3][6]

FUTURE GOALS/PLANS

Michelle Gatting’s 2025 schedule is packed tighter than a race weekend itinerary. As an official Porsche factory driver, she’ll be pulling triple duty across some of the most demanding endurance series in the world. In the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), she’ll team up with Rahel Frey and Celia Martin under Manthey Racing. For the IMSA SportsCar Championship’s Michelin Endurance Cup, she’ll join Frey and Sarah Bovy with Proton Competition. The European Le Mans Series (ELMS) will see her back with Bovy and Martin, also under Proton Competition. And if that weren’t enough, the Iron Dames are also slated to compete in the Asian Le Mans Series.[2][5]

The Porsche factory deal is a big one—it’s the kind of backing that eluded her in the early days, and it cements her status as a top-tier endurance driver. Whether she has her sights set on an outright Le Mans win, more WEC titles, or just continuing to prove that all-female lineups can compete at the highest level, she’s keeping those ambitions close to the chest. What’s clear: she’s not slowing down anytime soon.[1][2][5]

References:

Michelle Gatting – 51GT3
Michelle Gatting – Iron Dames
Christophorus: The Porsche Magazine – 2024
Kart Xpress – November 19, 2021
Endurance Info – 2024
Females in Motorsport – 2024
Racers Behind the Helmet
KartCom – April 23, 2024