Friday, January 18, 2008

She Fixes Beemers!


Nashuatelegraph.com: She knows bikes

I was just delighted when I saw the following press release in my mailbox. It was from Sandy at Second Wind BMW, right here in my home town of Nashua. Congratulations Nichole!!

SECOND WIND BMW / TRIUMPH is excited to announce that Nicole White is a Master Certified Technician for BMW Motorcycles. She is the youngest female to ever be BMW Master Certified and is only the 2nd woman in the United States to achieve this goal.

Nicole started her education at MMI (Motorcycle Mechanics Institute) in
Phoenix, AZ. When she graduated in June 2006, she was Tier One Certified
in Yamaha / Suzuki / Kawasaki / Honda and BMW brands. She graduated the first BMW class offered by MMI. Nicole started working at Second Wind BMW / Triumph in July 2006 and quickly gained her Triumph training certification. She continued to pursue Advanced BMW Certification and completed her Master Certification in December 2007.

When asked if she ever felt intimidated by her choice to compete in a male dominated field, Nicole replied “I did for a while, but you have to
quickly get over it. School helped a lot and when I was told that less
than thirty percent of students, male or female, actually finish and go into the field, I was determined.”

Nicole has been riding dirt bikes for about ten years and has aspirations for competing in off-road events such as hare scrambles, W.O.R.C.S. (World Off-Road Racing Championship Series) races and other local off-road challenges.

When asked how it felt to be the second master certified female in the United States, Nicole answered “It’s exciting. I didn’t expect that I would be only the second one or the youngest but it is a great accomplishment and I love what I do.”

Nicole’s advice for young women pursuing careers in previously male-dominated professions:

“Just because it is a male dominated field doesn’t mean you can’t do just as good a job, if not better. Let them be intimidated by you.”

2 comments:

Becky said...

That's really encouraging for females. I like her quote about letting the males be intimidated. You go girl! If I were younger, I think I would go for it myself. Too late now.....

Bikerchickz

Tracy Lee said...

That's totally awesome! I had wanted to be an architect, but was told by my guidance councilor (a female professional) that the mechanical drawing classes I wanted to take were "boy classes". It never occurred to me then to fight it, but y the time I finished high school, the classes had about 30% girls in them. That was a long time ago. I'm so glad things have changed thanks to women like you.

Congratulations!