At the end of the 2024 season, things were starting to click for American Mallory Dobbs. Six straight top-10 finishes in the inaugural World Women’s Circuit Racing series gave her the confidence that she needed after a tough start to the season. Dobbs, a former club racer and MotoAmerica Supersport competitor, said the 12 races over six rounds in Europe were a learning experience, a challenge, and something she can’t wait to do again.
“It’s been really cool, for me, to get a chance to race in Europe that I would never have gotten otherwise,” Dobbs said in the paddock at the season-ending round in Jerez.
Crashes and disappointing finishes marked the early part of the season. Dobbs retired from four of the first eight races, and most of her finishes were 15th or lower.
“It’s been a tough season. We’ve been taken out a couple of times. I’ve had a couple of small crashes on my own. It’s been a really big learning experience – the bike type, all these racetracks I’ve never been to before, new countries, new languages, new team, all of that. All the new things thrown at me all at one time. So it’s been a challenge. The results aren’t as good as I wanted them to be,” Dobbs says.
“But at the end of the season, we’ve been ramping up, getting better results, clicking off some top-10s, just kind of working our way up. That definitely brings up the confidence a bit for next year.”
Dobbs was thrown into the deep end. Not only was she learning to race the spec Yamaha YZF-R7 that the series uses, she was visiting tracks that she’d never turned a wheel on. And her competition was quick. She was up against racers like Supersport300 World Champion and WWCR World Champion (and former Moto3 and Moto2 racer) Ana Carrasco and Moto3, Supersport 300 and MotoE competitor Maria Herrera. And teams like Forward Racing, which has been in the MotoGP paddock for years, and Evan Brothers Racing, former Supersport World Champions.
Dobbs was chasing pace from the start and building consistency into it, as grid position turned out to be critical.
“I was learning a racetrack, not really getting a lot of ride time. We get 25 minutes of practice before we go out to qualify. And you’ve gotta do good in qualifying, because if you don’t, you’re in mid-pack, and there’s a lot of different ranges of experience, and that’s where you get taken out. Getting out in the front (in qualifying) is almost the more important race of the weekend, right? Getting the Superpole session well.
“When you’re learning a racetrack that you’ve never been to before, it’s hard to do that, especially when some of these girls have been riding all winter. Some of these girls and their teams have been testing since October.”
After four round-trip flights across the Atlantic and six straight weeks in Europe, Dobbs was ready to head back home to Washington state. And she said she was applying to race in the series next season.
“The best thing about this series is that it is giving an opportunity for women across the world to showcase their skills. Obviously, a lot of the Spanish girls have a lot of pace and are really talented. But we’re also seeing girls race from other countries, and without this, you would never see or hear about them otherwise.
“It’s the biggest thing I’ve ever done in my racing career, and it’s definitely been the hardest, but I’ve learned so much about me as a racer, and as a team manager and rider – it’s been good.”
