“It’s only a matter of time before she has an NHRA championship.” JCM Racing team owner Joe Maynard’s words exude his confidence in Ida Zetterström. The drag racing speedster hailing from Stockholm, Sweden, already has multiple championships on her resume. She is a three-time series champion on the European drag racing circuit – the FIA Top Fuel. Ida is also a two-time champion in the Super Street Bike category. But she has other plans in mind now.
Coming fresh off her 2023 Top Fuel title, Ida Zetterström relocated to Brownsburg, Indianapolis, from the Åland Islands of Finland in early 2024. She aimed for extraordinary heights in the NHRA series; however, a new responsibility comes with new challenges.
Ida Zetterström reveals her true worries
Being a multi-time motorsports champion already, Ida Zetterström can take on racetrack challenges with ease. However, she has encountered roadblocks in financial matters. As Ida prepared to make her NHRA debut in 2024, she gained partners like Edelbrock and VP Racing Fuels. While her roots with Edelbrock Performance ran deeper – the partnership began in 2021 – VP Racing Fuels was a new sponsor. Ida entered six NHRA Mission Foods Series events in 2024, and she planned to run a full schedule for JCM Racing in 2025. However, by December last year, Ida found it difficult to assemble enough sponsors to support her full-season interests.
Currently, Ida Zetterström is confirmed for a half-season schedule consisting of 10 races. This harsh reality, unfortunately, keeps the Swedish racer on her nerves, as she needs to find sponsorship to add more events to her season. Ida said so in a recent interview with Speed Freaks: “That is the tricky part of it right now because obviously, being someone that really wants to race the whole year, finding the funding for it, and focusing on filling in that schedule. And especially finding the money to race full seasons for years to come – it’s not just this year that is on my mind. It does take a lot of my mental space, and it does take a lot of what I’m doing during the days.”
At the back of her mind, Ida Zetterström still battles with her lack of funding. She confessed that it makes a difference in her approach to racing. “If you knew that you had a full season ahead of you, your mind space might be a little bit different because then you’re focusing on trying to win a championship.” So Ida’s message was clear. “I am focusing on chasing dollars instead of just chasing championships, you know.”
However, given her team owner’s expectations of her, Ida Zetterström is focused on her work as well. While adapting to closed-canopy cars of NHRA instead of the open canopy ones in Europe has been a challenge, she is focused on giving her best for all the sponsors she does have on board. “But I’m trying to find the balance between still working super hard on that and also focusing on the races that I’m going to, to make sure that I can actually be out here and be the best driver, the best teammate, the best representative for all my sponsors and everything. So I don’t want my mind to completely be eaten up by that when I go into a race,” she added.
Ida Zetterström’s concerns may extend to the NHRA racetrack as well. She is trying to adapt to the different Top Fuel cars and also improve her stellar 2024 season.
A constant will to improve
The main reason Ida Zetterström is so adamant about pursuing sponsorships is her passion. The Swedish racer’s love for racing is visible in her checkered history. Shattering gender norms, Ida became the first woman to win the Super Street Bike crown in 2019. So she could not wait to start wheeling on an NHRA track in 2024. Ida admittedly felt impatient as she had to wait six months to assemble her team and race car. She eventually made her debut in August at Minnesota’s Brainerd Int’l Raceway. She stunned four-time champion Steve Torrence in the first round. Furthermore, Ida completed the final eight races of the season with a best qualifying effort of eighth at the Texas Fall Nationals and was named the ‘Best New Talent’ by NHRA’s National Dragster publication at the Performance Racing Industry (PRI) show.
Working alongside her crew chief, Jon Schaffer, Ida Zetterström achieved a semifinal finish in 2024. But according to Ida, she has a long way to go as she aims to beat her scores. “I feel like we left a lot on the table when it comes to showing people what we’re capable of. Everyone else had a 12-race head start on us, so by the time we came out in August, the rest of the field had several months of getting the kinks worked out. Not to mention, many of those teams have worked together for years and years, whereas we were a brand-new team that was starting from scratch. Right as it started to feel like we were getting into our groove, the season ended. So, we’re ready to get back out there and prove ourselves.”
Evidently, a lot of struggles are lined up for the Swedish motorsports star. As Ida Zetterström navigates her NHRA journey, we wish her all the best!
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