Fisher

LONDON -- Sarah Fisher will become the first woman in 10 years to drive a Formula One car during a demonstration run at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway next week.

Fisher will drive a McLaren Mercedes car on Sept. 27, the first day of practice for the United States Grand Prix at the Indy circuit.

The 21-year-old Fisher, the only female driver in the Indy Racing League, became the first woman to start from the pole in any major racing series earlier this season at Kentucky.

Fisher, who also drove in the Indianapolis 500, visited the McLaren headquarters Wednesday for a seat fitting. She will drive the spare McLaren MP4-17 car, which the team takes to every race as backup for regular drivers David Coulthard and Kimi Raikkonen.

"I'm obviously very excited about driving a Formula One car in front of my home crowd,'' Fisher said. "It's extremely rare to get a chance like this and I can't wait. Hopefully it will help to promote Formula One in the USA and will also bring international attention to my series, the Indy Racing League as well.''

"Through our 39-year history we have never had a female drive one of our Formula One cars so I guess it's about time,'' said Martin Whitmarsh, McLaren International's managing director.

Fisher will be the first woman at the wheel of an F1 car since Italy's Giovanna Amati in 1992. Amati drove for Brabham but failed to qualify for a race.

Another Italian, Lella Lombardi, is the only woman to score a point in an F1 race. She drove her March to a sixth-place finish at the 1975 Spanish Grand Prix.

Fisher has an endorsement contract with Swiss watchmaker TAG Heuer, the official timekeeper for the F1 series.

The chances of Fisher making it to F1 eventually would appear to be remote, however, with McLaren team principal Ron Dennis saying last month that he could not envisage a woman racing in the championship.

"I think that, over-simplifying it, oval racing is a very different type of racing to circuit racing," he said. "(F1) requires different abilities and I think those abilities are more challenging for a woman to fulfill than for a man. I think it is very difficult for a woman to be competitive in Formula One."

Reuters contributed to this report.