SHE is the right-hand woman to a world champion Formula 1 driver, but Maguiresbridge woman Bernie Collins remains unfazed and dedicated to her role as Jenson Button’s exclusive performance engineer.
The 28-year-old secured the coveted position for this year’s Formula 1 season which will take her around the world with the McLaren Mercedes team as they embark on a campaign to compete for the world championship.
Following an offer to test drive the role at the 2013 India and Abu Dhabi Grand Prix when the regular performance engineer was on paternity leave, Bernie won the full time pole position for this year’s season.
Not one to let her gender stand in her way, the Queen’s University graduate admitted in a recent interview that the number of women in motorsport is continually growing.
She told a Sunday newspaper: “We’ve got some of the best engineers in the business.
“Whether it’s a male or female doing the job, it doesn’t matter. The number of women in engineering and motorsport in particular, is growing all the time.”
After graduating from Queen’s with a degree in mechanical engineering, Bernie applied for the highly competitive graduate trainee programme with McLaren Mercedes.
However, the then student was sceptical over her chances to seal a place on the programme, but used it as an opportunity to see the factory.
Then, following a number of online assessments and tests, Bernie was accepted on the programme in 2009.
Initially starting out as a transmission designer, she quickly moved on to become the performance engineer in 2012 which, she admitted, was nerve-wracking.
“It’s really a great opportunity. Each driver has one exclusive performance engineer, and I will be working with Jenson.”
She went on: “As well as the work side of things, I’ll get to visit lots of places I’ve never been to before – even though I’ll see very little of the actual country.
“Jenson and I have a very easy working relationship. I don’t see him as a famous person at all.
“I’ve worked with a number of drivers of the years, and I just have the attitude that they are a McLaren employee just like me.
“I think Irish people are a bit different in that we are a lot less impressed by fame.”
Now Surrey-based, she is currently in southern Spain testing Jenson’s car before embarking on the Grand Prix season.
This will take her from Australia to Malaysia, Bahrain, China, Europe, Japan, USA and finally Abu Dhabi in November.
Once the exhausting trip world-wide trip is over, Bernie admits that she plans to keep climbing the Formula 1 ladder.
“Hopefully, I’ll be in this position for the next few years and the next logical stop is race engineer.”
She explained: “That’s who decides the physical set up of the car, they are the person who leans over the pit wall and talks directly to the driver.
“But for now, I’m just concentrating on the season ahead.”
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