Jennifer is one of the seven "Queens of the Road" of 6ter -

Wlad SIMITCH / M6

  • The world of transport has 210,000 truck drivers in France, only 5% of whom are women.

  • To highlight them, 6ter is offering a documentary series,

    Les Reines de la Route

    , devoted to their profession, which necessarily takes precedence over their private life.

  • 20 Minutes

    interviewed Renaud Rahard, program director for Warner Bros, which produces the show.

They are at the wheel of the biggest templates on the road.

Lexie, Sarah and Chrystelle are among the 5% of women who work as truck drivers in France, out of a total of 210,000 truck drivers.

A category largely under-represented among the workforce of this profession which requires daily sacrifices.

In

Les Reines de la Route

, broadcast from this Thursday, January 7, seven of them agreed to take the 6ter cameras into their cabin to talk about it.

Four and a half months of follow-up

The program is an adaptation of a German format, called "Trucker Babes" (which could wisely translate as "the girls of the truck").

For four and a half months, the French version teams kept in touch with seven women drivers of heavy goods vehicles.

However, the cameras did not run so long.

To make the show more spectacular, the missions of the truck drivers have been carefully studied.

A load of gypsum in the largest underground quarry in Europe, trips back and forth in the fog, a crossing of the Rhône with a 44 tonnes, so many objectives that the "queens of the road" (almost) must achieve on a daily basis .

In the context of a television program, it is blessed bread since issues interfere in the program.

“There is time pressure.

You have to take things when they've just been made and take them to a place where they are expected, says Renaud Rahard, director of programs for Warner Bros, at

20 Minutes

.

How do we organize ourselves within this voltage of the charging socket and how to do it on time?

"

A program that has "to do with freedom"

One of the strengths of the program is undeniably its cast.

Aged 21 to 49, the seven selected are keen to pass on their passion, whether they've been riding for ten years or only a year and a half.

“It also has to do with freedom,” says Renaud Rahard.

All the women who do have decided to be free.

They all have a strong personality to pass the HGV license, to be responsible for their load and to be in contact with the people they are confronted with all day.

"

To find them, the production directly called on transport companies "because it was very important to have the agreement and collaboration of employers", notes Renaud Rahard.

She then relied on various criteria such as their age or their desire to participate in the program.

"We had the choice because overall they are quite formidable women who are good characters in their majority," says the director of programs of Warner Bros.

The show's stressful moments are intertwined with more intimate moments of life, when women testify to the fear that may have animated them at the beginnings of their careers when they had to sleep alone in their cabin, but also more funny.

We will especially remember Sarah, 29, who crosses the Italian border and who takes selfies with male truck drivers, amazed to see a woman doing their job.

A situation that does not abrupt the young woman who never loses her smile, despite these somewhat clumsy men who, for their part, would almost feed the clichés.

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  • Television

  • program

  • Driver

  • Heavy weights

  • Women

  • Truck