The sport of Formula One is known for showcasing speed, luxury, feats of engineering and athletic achievement. It can also be male-dominated, unwelcoming to new fans and confusing: Cost caps? DRS? Sprint races? How does it all work?
As the sport continues to grow its fan base, Kate Lizotte and Nicole Sievers are creating a community where everyone can feel included. Two Girls 1 Formula is an online-turned-in-person community of fans who support each other’s interests in the sport, whether they care about the driver’s championship standings, fashion or relationships. Since launching, Two Girls 1 Formula has grown to include a podcast, merchandise, gatherings and more.
Local faces, international community
Lizotte grew up in Westford, attended Quinnipiac University in Connecticut and then moved to Boston to work at 451 Agency. She now lives on Cape Cod. It was at 451, now Zozimus, that Lizotte became close with Sievers, who is originally from Chicago but moved East to attend college at Boston University.
“That kind of kicked things off and we just have really been inseparable,” Lizotte said.
Sievers said that while she was first introduced to Formula One through her partner at the time, it was when she met Lizotte that they really became involved in the sport. The friends started living next door to each other in Southie in 2018 and would turn race weekends into all-day events, with food, drinks and gossip. During the pandemic, they created their own Covid pod and continued their brunches and race watching.
One day while Lizotte was working in Sievers’ kitchen, their shared interest began evolving into something a bit more formal.
“(Kate) just turns to me and she’s like, ‘How funny would it be if we started a blog called Two Girls 1 Formula?’” Sievers said. “And I said, ‘That’s hysterical, I'm buying the domain right now.’”
Throughout that race season, the pair began posting about their themed brunches on a Two Girls 1 Formula Instagram account and wrote a handful of blog posts, Sievers said.
At first, they wanted to stay anonymous and fit into the Formula One media that already existed.
“We were running into a lot of issues with finding spaces to feel safe in the male-dominated conversation,” Sievers said.
At the end of the 2020 season, Lizotte and Sievers decided they were done hiding their “fangirl” energy. Instead, they wanted to create “a safe space for the girls, gays and theys (and cool dudes)” in Formula One, per their new mission statement. The shift included a book club with a Formula One romance series and a Discord channel for their community.
“That’s kind of where things shifted, and we saw a huge pivot in how our content was being received,” Sievers said.
Next up on their list of areas to shake up was the Formula One merchandise industry, which they said was known for making logo-covered, men’s cut polos. Sievers and Lizotte made an Etsy shop and, using Canva, created T-shirts designed for female fans.
Then came the podcast. They bought “pretty cheap microphones and just went for it,” Lizotte said. Now they’ve recorded 80 episodes and logged over 200,000 downloads. The podcast includes conversations recapping races, but also touches on such topics as fashion, pop culture and relationships.
A bigger vision for TG1F
Since connecting at 451, Lizotte and Sievers have moved through several different roles. Sievers has since worked at SmartBear, NextView Ventures and SeatGeek. Lizotte spent time at BIGfish Communications and now works for Win Brands Group. Through it all, they’ve kept growing Two Girls 1 Formula as a passion project. Lizotte said in the year ahead they’re trying to work with more brands related to Formula One, and they just secured their first podcast sponsor. They’re also looking for ways to bring their online community together in the real world through meetups at races and watching TV coverage at local bars.
“I think there’s some fun content out there, and it’s exciting to see more journalists and especially more pop culture, lifestyle outlets caring about this sport. But I still think there’s a lot of work to be done,” Lizotte said. “So we’d love to see where we can bring content that people want to see, continue to try to cultivate this really inclusive community for people. So I think it’s video content. It’s more in-person meetups and just seeing how we can take this community from being just online to more in person.”
Welcoming fans old and new
Sievers and Lizotte were already following Formula One before the Netflix show “Drive to Survive” thrust the sport into the spotlight in 2019. The docudrama follows the drivers, managers and teams as they compete each season. Many long-standing fans view the millions of people who have become interested in Formula One through the Netflix series as “fake fans,” Sievers said.
“Our ethos has always been, it doesn’t matter if you started watching yesterday or if you’ve been watching your entire life — you are welcome here as long as you’re respectful towards everyone else,” Sievers said. “We have so many people within the community who have a variety of different interests … from the fashion aspect of who the stylists are to the very technical side of things to the historical accuracy of every single team name.”
Sievers said she loves seeing how the teams and individuals manage relationships with one another, while Lizotte likes to take deeper dives into how Formula One has become a cultural phenomenon, with drivers like Lewis Hamilton and Daniel Ricciardo going to the Met Gala.
No matter why or when fans came to Formula One, Lizotte and Sievers say they’re welcome on their team.
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