Penny Mallory, at a glance
Penny Mallory is a UK motivational keynote speaker and leading authority on Mental Toughness. A Rally Champion, the first woman to compete in a World Rally Car, Mental Toughness expert, Author, TV Presenter and she is about to row across the Atlantic Ocean. She speaks about Resilience,, Leadership Under Pressure, Confidence, Team work, Change, Uncertainty and High Performance.
Known for: Mental Toughness, Resilience and Performing Under Pressure
Background: Rally Champion, World Rally Car driver, TV presenter, Author, Boxer, Mountaineer, marathon runner, Atlantic Ocean rower
Audiences: Leadership teams, Sales teams, Executive Teams, Networking Groups, Employee engagement events, Annual conferences, Womens groups and National and International organisations facing pressure and change
Speaking: UK and International corporate events and conferences
From rock bottom to Rally Champion
I'm a keynote speaker who is committed to developing my Mental Toughness, and helping others to do the same. But let's go back to where it all started…
I grew up in a quiet Kent village, a painfully average kid, praised for making the occasional effort, but little else.
To the outside world, my life would have looked pretty perfect, but that was a far cry from the reality of life inside my family home. I was scared of my father. I didn’t get on with my brother. My godfather should have been locked up for the part he played in it all. And then there was my poor mum.
My mum was a lovely woman, but she was an alcoholic and a really severe manic depressive. In the 60s and 70s, people suffering as severely as my mum were sedated, sectioned, and sent to dreadful Victorian ‘lunatic asylums’. As a child visiting, all I can remember is the crazy looking people everywhere, the smell of urine, disinfectant and despair lingering in the air.
From a very young age, I struggled to communicate with my family and felt alone and uncomfortable wherever I was. School was a place to be disruptive in order to get some attention. As time passed, my behaviour and school work deteriorated.
At 11, my parents had the inevitable ugly divorce, and my mum was awarded custody of the children. That still blows my mind. My brother went off to the army. So it was just me and my mother, but there was little parenting going on. I was regularly shoplifting for the essentials and drinking way too much. I was damaging and hurting myself in all sorts of ways.
By 14, I'd had enough of the madness at home, and I left. I never went back. My father wrote to me, “You are a disgrace. I want nothing more to do with you.” You could have heard my stomach drop.
Age 16, I was living in homeless hostels in London, my boyfriend was a heroin addict, and life wasn’t working out the way it was meant to. Daily life was proving to be a challenge, and I was spiralling downhill fast. It took me hitting rock bottom to make a decision. I was going to change my story. All my life, I had wanted to drive rally cars, so I scraped together enough money for a rally driving course. That day changed my life.
From my Roughest to my Toughest
Fast forward 12 years, my co-driver and I had become National Rally Champions, and we went on to become the first women in the world to compete in a World Rally Car for Ford.
I had become obsessed with human performance, and what it took to succeed and win. That obsession has never left me.
Then came TV presenting, extreme sports, running multiple marathons, climbing the world's highest mountains and fighting in the boxing ring twice. I'm now training, with my team, to row 3000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean, in a tiny boat, in Dec 2026.
Life isn't about willpower : It's about why power
My story isn’t about success. It’s about taking the chaos, mess and pain and transforming it into power. I wasn’t ‘built’ for resilience - I built it.
And now I show others how to do the same.
Mental Toughness isn’t about being fearless. It’s about showing up scared - and doing it anyway. It’s about bouncing back. It’s about changing perspective, attitude and mindset. It’s about managing the pressure, the stress and learning from it all. If you are interested in Mental Toughness Coaching, don't hesitate to reach out. Alternatively, if you are looking for an inspirational and experienced female speaker for your next event, get in touch.
Listen to Penny on Radio 4 with Adrian Chiles
Penny shared a little of her story with Adrain Chiles, on Radio 4, Oct 31 2026
