To celebrate International Women’s Day 2021, The Executive Magazine speaks to Julie Hunter, Global Operations Director of Ultimate Driving Tours.

From Europe to Asia and the Americas, Julie has spent years traversing the globe with a passion for travel, adventure and finding unique experiences. As co-owner and the first full-time team member at Ultimate Driving Tours, Julie has overseen the development of all aspects of the business and the expanding team, while creating and curating UDT’s ever-increasing calendar of unforgettable events.

Have you seen a change in the travel and motorsports industry since you first started generally and also in relation to representation of women in this field?

“I have experienced a shift in both over my time. Our office team is 90% female, and it is a wonderfully talented, diverse and strong-minded team. Our events team tends to have more men than women, which is perhaps because we are a driving-oriented travel company and most professional drivers, automotive logistics personnel and automotive content creators tend to be men, but I think this will change over the coming years.

“I’m excited to say our guests are typically couples (from being mostly men when I started), and it is also not unheard of for us to have solo women drivers join tours now, which I love. For both our teams and guests we work hard to foster an inclusive and open community where everyone feels welcome.

“We continue to add strong and inspiring women to our team, and our client base has similarly shifted as our tours have been designed not to be ‘a boy’s trip’ but an experience for enthusiasts of luxury adventure travel which just happens to take place in cars. I think the same shift is slowly happening in motorsport. But we are very much still on the journey, so I hope the interest and involvement of women in both fields continues to gain momentum’’.