For the French footballer Emmanuel Clément (1971), see Emmanuel Clément. For the French footballer Emmanuel Clément-Demange (1970), see Emmanuel Clément-Demange. For the Portuguese clergyman Manuel Clemente, see Manuel Clemente.
Emmanuelle Clément (born ~1997[1]) is a French sidecar racer (passenger). She is a two times SupersideFIM World Sidecar Champion, after winning the championship with driver Todd Ellis in 2022 and 2023.[2][3] Clément is the second female sidecar world champion after Kirsi Kainulainen, who won it in 2016. She is also a two times British Champion.
Clément is the third French sidecar racing world champion. All three of them raced with an English partner. The other two are driver Alain Michel with passenger Simon Birchall in 1990 and Grégory Cluze passenger of Tim Reeves in 2014.[4]
Early career
2017
In 2017, Clément took part in sidecar racings for the first time, when she competed at the French FSBK[note 1] championships replacing the injured Kevin Rousseau as passenger of reigning French champion Sébastien Delannoy at the races in Nogaro, Lédenon and Pau-Arnos. In Lédenon and Pau-Arnos they won both races while in Lédenon they finished both races in second place. With his passengers Rousseau and Clément, Delannoy became French champion for the fourth time that season in the 1000cc sidecar class.[5][6][7][8]
Later that season, Clément also filled in as passenger with Manuel Moreau at Circuit Magny-Cours where they won the first race, and at Circuit Carole in Tremblay-en-France where they finished in second place in the second race.[9] She also drove test and training rides with French 2016 Formula 2 Sidecar champion Estelle Leblond.[note 2][9][10]
2018
During the first round of the FSBK-F1 races, Clément drove the second race on the Circuit Bugatti in Le Mans again as passenger of Manuel Moreau, whose regular passenger, Belgian Jonathan Brichard, fell of the machine during training and broke his toe.[11] During the third round at Magny Cours, Clément once again replaced Rousseau as passenger of reigning French champion Sébastien Delannoy; they won both races, and Delannoy became French champion for the fifth time in 2018.
Sidecar World Championship
In 2019, Clément was the regular passenger of French driver Paul Leglise. They finished in ninth place in the World Championships[12][13] and eleventh in the FSBK-F1 Championship in France.[14][15]
In 2019, Clément was also the regular passenger of the British driver Scott Lawrie in the 1000 cc sidecar class of the German IDM Championship.[note 3] They finished eleventh.[16]
In the corona season 2020, Clément was the regular passenger of the Finnish five times world champion Pekka Päivärinta, but fewer races were held and the FIM World Sidecar Championship was cancelled. In the IDM they finished in fifth place[17] and in the International Sidecar SuperPrix 2020, a competition organized by the German and British federations when the FIM World Sidecar Championship 2020 was canceled due to the restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic,[18][19][20][21] they finished ninth.[22]
^Nutley, Barry (20 October 2021). "Dramatic end to season at Brands with Birchalls already champions". Retrieved 3 November 2023. British Sidecar Championship 2021 Final Standings: B.Birchall/T.Birchall 340, Blackstock/Rosney 271, J.Holden/Pitt 189, Ellis/Clément 140, Holland/T.Christie 135, Biggs/Schmitz 126, Lawrie/Smithies 122, Archer/Hyde 119, Peach/Edwards 108, Bell/Connell 105.'
^Formula 1 Sidecarraces are driven with long machines or kneelers, road racing sidecars with a very low construction, which means that the driver has to sit in a kneeling position in front of the rear-mounted engine. Formula 2 Sidecar races are raced with short machines or seaters, road racing sidecars over which the driver, just like on a solo motorcycle, is seated ‘over’ the engine.
^IDM = Internationalen Deutschen Motorradmeisterschaft (en:International German Motorcycle Championschip)