Canadians are blazing a trail for female drivers in male-dominated sport

Demi Chalkias grew up in the country, on the outskirts of Stouffville, Ont. The family had no cable or internet, but there were plenty of dirt bikes, ATVs and tractors to play with.

"I loved driving anything with an engine," she said.

Chalkias would set up a course on their driveway using basketballs as pylons and steer one of their many vehicles through it, sometimes backwards.

She went on to be a high-level triathlete, but when a serious hip injury ended her career, she turned to driving.

"You feel kind of sorry for yourself for a while, but then you start thinking, 'OK, well, what can I do? I'm not useless.'

"So I put myself into go-karting, and it turned out that I had a natural talent for the sport and a huge passion. And so, I just pursued it full force and made a career out of it."

Last fall, Chalkias and fellow Canadians Nicole Havrda and Cherie Storms raced a Mercedes-AMG GT4 as an all-female team in an endurance race at California's Buttonwillow Raceway Park.

Chalkias and Havrda were guests of Mercedes at the Montreal Grand Prix this past weekend as part of the "She's Mercedes" platform, a global initiative which aims to empower women in the sport.

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Chalkias says motorsports provides a rare level playing field when it comes to physical stature. Being big and strong isn't an advantage.

"The car sees no gender, it makes zero difference if you're female or male, or whatever you identify by," the 27-year-old said.

Still, in a sport in which few could name a female driver beyond Danica Patrick, the percentage of female drivers is minute. Only two women have ever qualified and started in an F1 race: Maria Teresa de Filippis in 1958-59 and Lella Lombardi,