Naomi Schiff

Motorsport’s Super Smart Broadcaster

By Bonnie Langedijk

While Naomi Schiff no longer spends most of her time in a race car, she’s never taken her foot off the gas. The thirty-year-old Rwandan-Belgian racer turned Formula One analyst, is redefining a sport that’s still largely ruled by men. Growing up karting, Schiff is used to living life in the fast lane. At the age of 16, she began her career in single seaters where she won the Clio Cup Asia series in 2014 and the KTM X-Bow battle in 2018 before retiring. A stint as an analyst and presenter at the all-female W Series followed, from where Schiff quickly became a fixture in motorsport broadcasting. Traveling from Monaco to Silverstone or the 24 Hours of Le Mans, it’s rare to find Schiff at her home in Paris. Her expertise and experience as a racer make her one of motorsport's most knowledgeable analysts – seamlessly pairing her sharp insights with standout charm.

Bonnie: You started your career through carting. Do you remember the moment when you realized you wanted to make a career out of it?

Naomi: I was always very competitive growing up. The first time I experienced a go-kart, which was at an indoor go-karting birthday party, I really loved it. I already knew then that it had sparked my interest in a way that other sports maybe hadn't. There wasn't one moment where I said, I want to do this for the rest of my life but it was always clear as day. When I got a little bit more mature and realized that there was a chance that that career path wouldn’t crystalize, I wanted to set myself up for whatever opportunity to remain within the motorsport industry. Sports psychology was the one thing that I thought I could do in case I ever needed a backup plan to stay in motorsports. 

It takes a certain type of person to know, without a doubt, that’s what I’m going to build my life around

Naomi: It's not a surface level thing, right? You have to experience so many things within any industry to see whether it's what fits you for a career path. With racing it's obviously slightly different because you're being nurtured to have that career path from a very young age already. Sometimes it blocks other things out of sight as well. But for me it was just a true, real passion.

“When I look back, I think how frustrating it is that MONEY is often the reason that you don't succeed in the sport. Who are the Lewis Hamiltons or the Max Verstappen's out there that we don't even know exist because they don't even have access to the sport?”

Do you think that necessity to nurture someone's talent in racing in particular, paired with the large investment needed from the beginning, results in motorsports being quite homogenous?

Naomi: The high entry barrier is one of the biggest challenges with motorsports. At the time I was lucky enough that my dad funded quite a lot of my early carting. Then I was picked up by local sponsors in South Africa, and that's what kept us going for a while. I went on a whole path of going from one sponsor to another and trying to find the funds to be able to keep going. That's also part of the reason why I'm not racing anymore. When I look back, I think how frustrating it is that money is often the reason that you don't succeed in the sport. Who are the Lewis Hamiltons or the Max Verstappen's out there that we don't even know exist because they don't even have access to the sport? A lot of what I do is about empowering young women and inspiring the next generation. Sometimes I have conversations with people from really disadvantaged backgrounds and it's so difficult for me to figure out what to say to them because I know that there's still a huge financial barrier that anyone who wants to participate in the sport has to overcome. Thankfully that is evolving. The likes of racing simulators and other methods are able to bridge that gap a little bit. But it's true that whether you have the money or not, someone has to fit the bill. It's an expensive store sport no matter which way you slice it.

What about the racing ecosystem? How would you describe the sport to a motorsport novice?

Naomi: While most sports are totally physical or mostly about human performance, motorsport combines human performance with the pinnacle of automotive engineering. If you love cars and you love being at the absolute limit of what technology and a car can do paired with a pilot at the wheel of that kind of technology, motorsports is it. In terms of the ecosystem, it's a very male dominated sport but over the last decade, it's been changing a lot. A decade ago, it might have been a daunting environment for female fans or females who are interested in getting a job. If you walk into an F1 paddock today, it's very gender diverse. Whether it's in broadcasting or engineering, in the pit lane or in mechanics. There are lots of women in the industry today and we're starting to infiltrate the men's space. The audience today is 40% female versus a 60% male audience. Statistically, that's a great figure.

That is a great figure. The sports industry often creates a singular image and message around women in sport, and it’s always centered around empowerment. While men often get the opportunity to present themself as the individual they are. What’s your take on the narrative around women and sport?

Naomi: Some of the opportunities that I got in my racing career felt very gimmicky. It would be like: We want you, but we're going to put you in an all girls racing team. It's great that it promotes female talent and that it gets me a drive when I don't have options, but why does it always have to be that tokenistic gesture? It's a vicious circle. It all comes down to how seriously these things are being taken, how they're being positioned. Over the last couple of years, we've seen how people are taking it more seriously. There's more investment, broadcasters are putting more effort into showing all female sports and as a result we are starting to recognize these athletes as individuals. In F1 there's no women on the grid right now. We haven't had a female Formula1 driver since 1976, which is clearly far too long ago. But we do have F1 Academy [a female-only and junior-level single-seater racing championship founded by Formula One]. By founding something like this, it shows there’s an intention for the future. This isn’t the end goal for women in motorsport, it's a stepping stone for them to eventually end up in Formula One. 

A lot has changed. Even when you look at sports like basketball, football, tennis.

Naomi: When things started to turn for football, that’s when people started scratching their heads and thinking, oh wow, this female sports thing can actually be a thing. We can't leave it there. We've got to make sure that it hits across the board whether it's basketball or rugby or motorsport. Women and young girls should see that they can participate in whatever sport they like.

The economy behind it all is so important as well. Who invests into it? What do athletes get paid? And is that equal? 

Naomi: I always say that in terms of helping female sport, everybody can do their part. If each individual at home decided, I'm going to a female football match or I'm going to go to an F1 Academy race or I'm going to tune into the F1 Academy broadcast, that makes a difference. You can then go to your sponsors and say, well, look at how much interest there is, look how many people are watching. People are more likely to invest, you're more likely to get a better TV slot, and automatically that trickles down. Everybody has the power to do something about these issues that seem more distant than they really are.

You could say racing is a hybrid between a team sport and an individual one, as you're working with a team, but you’re in the car alone. How do you think that affects the athlete, but also the way you can analyze a sport?

Naomi: As a driver you don't just represent yourself, you represent an army of people. You go into the car knowing that you've got loads of sponsors who have put money towards this very moment, and your whole team has been working so hard to deliver the next version of this car that's going to take this team potentially further. There’s a lot of pressure. But ultimately when it comes to being on track you are alone in the car and you don’t have others to rely on, as it would be in traditional team sports, so every single performance has to be perfect, you always have to give it your all. It can be a challenging balance sometimes because often you are the one who carries the reputation, delivers the happiness or even the deception, You're the one who gets the bad press or the good press. I think it's one of the interesting intricacies about the sport.

It must be tough for an athlete to not be able to control every aspect of the performance. 

Naomi: The driver is a part of the result, the driver is not the result. The team plays a huge role. That’s the case in all levels of motorsport, but in Formula One, it's even more evident because you have 10 non-identical cars because obviously the teams each have identical cars theoretically. It's proven again and again that the car is a huge part of the results. The generation of drivers in Formula One right now really just want to be a Red Bull driver, while a couple of years ago you wanted to drive for Mercedes because they had a weapon that could help you deliver this battle. But again, all the factors have to come together. The driver has to bring it across the line. The pit stop crew have to do a perfect job. So many details have to come together for that result to be possible.

You’ve pivoted from the life of an athlete to analyst. Are there any similarities between the two careers? And how do you think your experiences as an athlete influence your work as an analyst? 

Naomi: In Covid I had to make the tough decision to stop racing, because I had no finances left and I couldn't find the sponsors I needed. I think when drivers retire, or any person for that matter, you have a little bit of an identity crisis. For so long people always referred to me as ‘Naomi, the racing driver’ and I didn't know what the future was going to look like. As an analyst, I really get to tap into my racing knowledge and my experiences as a racing driver. There's definitely a correlation between the two. Sometimes people ask me who my favorite driver is in Formula One, but I'm not in a position to have favorites. It's no secret that I've said during my career that Lewis [Hamilton] was my idol. I've always said that growing up and that information isn't going to just disappear. But, I'm able to be impartial because I just see them as I would see my competitors. As an athlete, you can admire people, but you always have to see everybody as an equal, otherwise you can't race them hard. As an analyst, I see it exactly the same way. I can't be wowed by the fact that, now I'm standing next to Fernando Alonso, who I grew up watching on TV and admire his racing skills. I'm going to ask him tough questions. I see things as if they would've been my competitors. That's helped me in the way that I do my job. Then there's also the empathy part of it. Sometimes journalists can ask very tough questions, and I understand that's a hundred percent a part of the job. You want to do justice to your audience at home. What do they want to know? What would they be asking right now? But having been on the receiving end of those kinds of questions for so many years, I know which kinds of questions I was more likely to interact with. At the end of the day, I think if you put one of the drivers on the defensive, you're not going to get the answer you want anyway. It's about finding a way to have empathy while asking a difficult question. 

Whether you’re an athlete or someone who is in the public eye, people often feel the freedom to criticize. How do you deal with that direct loop of feedback and often negativity? The F1 sport is known to be patriarchal, and quite traditional in its view of the world.

Naomi: I always consider myself someone who has really thick skin, but when I got into this job I realized I'm not as tough as I thought. You're not used to people having so many opinions about every single thing you do. What can be really frustrating is that it's often not about what I actually do. It's always about my appearance whether that's because I'm a woman, or because of my skin color or what I'm wearing or my makeup. You just wonder, are you actually paying attention to the job I'm doing, or is all you can see the appearance? I'm not insecure about any of those things really, so it doesn't get to me as much. If they were to pinpoint one of my insecurities, it would probably do more damage and sometimes that does happen. It's important to surround yourself with people who are able to disassociate from that and who are able to put things back into perspective. Sometimes it can really be crippling. I don't want to base the way I behave, dress, look, or act on a minority of people who happen to have this weird habit of speaking about other people online in a negative way.

I can’t imagine what that must be like. People will always have opinions and you’re great at what you do. It’s really inspiring to see and hear how you deal with that. 

Naomi: Thank you. But I also want to emphasize that I don't always stay strong. I don't want people to think that that's a reality. It's okay to say that it affects me sometimes, but on average I just try to use it as fuel for my fire. I'll find a way to put a positive twist on those things because otherwise they just drag you down. But sometimes it's all about laying in bed with some ice cream, having a little cry and moving on.

Absolutely. What's your choice of ice cream?

Naomi: Ice cream is a bad choice of words because I personally am not a huge fan of ice cream. It's french fries for me.

Oh, I love french fries.

Naomi: They're my absolute weakness because I'm Belgian. French fries and mayo, you know.

Classic. I'm Dutch. I get it. To wrap things up, what excites you about the future?

Naomi: The current state of affairs with F1 Academy being on the F1 calendar with 10 teams and big brands like Charlotte Tilbury, Tommy Hilfiger and Amex on board, is very exciting. I think that within the decade, we'll have a woman involved in Formula One. And I think it'll be a lot sooner than that, that we'll have at least one as a development driver or reserve driver. We've already got Jess Hawkins and Jamie Chadwick who are involved with teams, but we want them to be in bigger roles. We're on the right path. Personally, I recently turned 30 and someone advised me to create a bucket list. So I'm going to create a bucket list so that I'll be able to answer this question next time.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

MORE HUR CONVERSATIONS