For a certain type of woman, glamour modelling has long represented a path to opportunity.

Not necessarily a happy path, nor an easy one; but one that has nevertheless served many— from Kelly Brook to Katie Price (now both multi-millionaires) — surprisingly well.

Now, it seems, that well-worn route to stardom beloved of so many comely girls with big ambitions and matching assets is fast disappearing.

In the latest wave of post-Weinstein purges, and undoubtedly in response to the hysterical reaction to the undeniably seedy Presidents Club dinner, where young women were hired as ‘hostesses’ and then treated like pieces of meat, Formula One’s ‘grid girls’ have been banned from the 2018 season.

These sexy young women — who have traditionally been a fixture of the racing scene — didn’t perform any ostensible function that actually has any impact on the sport, but simply stood trackside, presented the odd trophy and gave male punters something pretty to look at while the cars were at the other end of the track.

F1 Champion James Hunt with the Race Queen at the first United States Grand Prix in 1976

A woman in a bikini made from small wheels stands facing one camera as a posse of photographers behind her snap away

Jarno Trulli and Heinz-Harald Frentzen are flanked by two Jordan girls at the GP Von San Marino 2000

Pit girls smile walk through the paddock ahead of the Australian Formula One Grand Prix at the Albert Park Circuit on March 15, 2007 in Melbourne, Australia

Monza in 1999. Two pit girls in Italy pose up for the camera by leaning on two car tyres

Two pit girls during the World Superbike Championship at the Brands Hatch circuit in England in August 1996

Britain’s world champion driver Graham Hill — taking a naughty glance at one of his companion’s chests — is flanked by two grid girls

According to Formula One spokesman Sean Bratches, the practice of employing grid girls has gone out of fashion and is ‘at odds’ with modern-day values.

The move comes just days after the Professional Darts Corporation announced that it, too, was going to trim back on totty by getting rid of the walk-on girls.

No doubt other male-dominated sports where pretty young women in tight dresses and bathing suits are a regular fixture — snooker, boxing, wrestling and so on — will feel duty-bound to follow suit.

Of course, there are many who claim this as a major victory in the fight against sexism and inequality. A new feminist dawn in which young women are no longer forced to debase themselves and their bodies simply for the entertainment of men.

Women of glamour, rise up against the oppression of the patriarchy: you have nothing to lose but your nipple tassels.

Playboy: 1976 Formula One World champion James Hunt is pictured with model Sue Shaw

Ladies man: James Hunt enjoys the company of a group of women following the end of a race

James Hunt is pictured with a local woman in the pits before the 1977 Argentina Grand Prix in Buenos Aires

Except, of course, they do. They have a lot to lose, starting with a steady income, financial independence and the prospect of nabbing a career in showbusiness or, failing that, a rich boyfriend. In other words, options. A future. Something that many of these young women simply wouldn’t have otherwise.

And all for what? So that their less attractive and allegedly intellectually superior sneering sisters can pursue an anti-male agenda which, if it reaches its logical conclusion, will end up with the human race disappearing off the face of the planet altogether on account of no man daring to speak to any woman ever again.

Scores of perfectly happy women, who are employed to do something they appear to (for the most part) enjoy and which brings great pleasure to many, will now find themselves out of a job. What are they supposed to do?

And yet all this is celebrated as some great triumph — mostly by middle-class female journalists, commentators and MPs — who have no concept and probably no interest in what these girls think, just as long as they get to stop men doing what men are naturally programmed to do: enjoy looking at attractive young women.

A pit girl at the GP Von Ungarn in Budapest back in 2001

For that, folks, is Feminism 2018: working-class glamour girls on the dole; middle-class intellectuals on the make.

The irony, of course, is that those very same pressure groups demanding an end to glamour-girl culture are the very same who are forever blethering on about how it’s a woman body and she should be able to do what she wants with it.

These are the hard-line abortionists, the free-the-nipple loons (who believe women have the right to show their nipples on social media) and the pro-prostitute campaigners.

Woe betide anyone who tries to place restraints on their freedoms.

And surely the same principle should apply to every woman?

Except it doesn’t.

In the warped post-Weinstein ideological landscape of Me Too and Time’s Up, self-determination applies only if it falls within the approved parameters.

And that does not include doing anything that might bring any enjoyment to men.

Like judgmental Victorian spinsters, today’s feminist moralisers look at the likes of Charlotte Wood and Daniella Allfree — the two darts walk-on girls who spoke up this week about how much they enjoyed their jobs — and find them in dire need of being patronised out of existence.

And so, while the BBC’s former China editor, Carrie Gracie — who resigned from her job over unequal pay (despite being offered a rise when she complained) — delivers a lecture to MPs of quite spectacular sanctimoniousness, countless women preparing for a lucrative season of Lycra-wearing in F1 are scanning the small ads in Tesco.

Great job, ladies.

BRM driver Helmuth Marko with pit girls before the 1972 Belgian Grand Prix at Nivelles

Ferrari driver, Michael Schumacher of Germany with the Formula One girls before the Australian Grand Prix at Albert Park in Melbourne, Australia in 1998

Alain Prost stands on a mechanic's box with an arm around a pit girl in front of a sea of photographers

Photographers snap away at three pit girls in Budapest at the 1999 GP Von Ungarn

Four pit girl mimic changing a tyre on a car in front of a gathered crowd of fans at Barcelona in 2002

From a '60s Japanese pop star to Katie Price and Love Island's Olivia Atwood: How the grid girl ban spells the end of a long and VERY colourful part of Formula One history

By Siofra Brennan for MailOnline

From a Japanese '60s pop star who paved the way for countless glamorous girls in the decades ahead to a fresh-faced teenage Katie Price, the demise of grid girls means the end of a long and colourful history.

Walk-on grid girls were axed from Formula One today as motorsport bosses said they would not feature in the upcoming season, which starts in Australia in two months' time, because it is not in keeping with their 'brand values'.

While many support the decision, the sport was also criticised for taking the glamour away from the sport, with some claiming grid girls, who work long hours on race weekends, shouldn't have their jobs taken away from them.

Here, Femail reveals how the tradition began in Japan in the '60s and is now used by hopefuls as a launchpad into modelling and TV careers.

Lewis Hamilton with grid girls in Sochi at the 2015 Russian Grand Prix. Today it was announced that the glamorous pit girls will not feature in the upcoming racing season

1960s: The original promo girls

Japanese model and singer Rosa Ogawa, now 71, was the original racing glamour girl who came to prominence in the late 1960s as brands started to use motorsport as an opportunity to advertise their products.

Back then, the role largely involved holding up a sign while looking pretty.

Soon the US embraced the concept of the grid girl and it took off worldwide.

Japanese model and singer Rosa Ogawa, now 71, is cited as the first ever grid girl, appearing at races back in the 1960s to promote various brands

A glamorous model strikes a pose for photographer at the 1968 British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch

1970s and 1908s

The '70s was the decade that critics hark back to, citing the increasingly tight-fitting outfits that became the unofficial grid girl uniform.

Silverstone boss Stuart Pringle recently said: 'Lycra can stay in the 1970s and 80s for me, I don’t want any of that tarty nonsense.'

A tight fitting lycra playsuit teamed with knee high boots became the unofficial uniform of the grid girls as the glamour stakes increased.

STP pit babes in front of the March-Ford truck during the 1971 season, wearing tight-fitting lycra playsuits and red PVC boots

BRM driver Peter Gethin with two Marlboro pit-babes before the 1972 Spanish Grand Prix at Jarama

1990 and 2000s

Eddie Jordan who ran the Jordan Grand Prix team in the late '90s and 2000s pioneered the use of grid girls.

'Commercially it was a huge thing at the time,' he told a 5 live Sport documentary in December 2017. 'I was involved with Benson & Hedges. The idea was it should be fun.

'Motor racing is a very serious business very commercial and it needs to have a very respectable return on the investment. But at the same time it also needed to show flair, excitement all of the other razzmatazz that goes with racing.

Jordan drivers Damon Hill and Ralf Schumacher (right) relax with models Jordan (left) and Melinda Messenger at Silverstone in 1998

Melinda Messenger, Jordan and Emma Noble posing for the Jordan Grand Prix team

When Katie Price was just 19-years-old she was a grid girl for Jordan Formula One at the 1998 Barcelona Grand Prix

'That went out after a while and I often wonder why. It was certainly instrumental in us getting more coverage.'

'We had all the major models at the time, they were so keen to get into the yellow swimsuits. Katie Price, she was the catalyst.'

Katie Price was a Jordan grid girl in 1998 at the age of 19, joining other big name models of the time including Melinda Messenger and Emma Noble.

Eddie Jordan who ran the Jordan Grand Prix team in the late '90s and 2000s pioneered the use of grid girls to add a touch of glamour to motorsport

2010s: Launchpad for a reality TV career

Olivia Attwood, 26, one of the stars of Love Island 2017 began her career as a pit girl.

For three years before she joined the hit reality show, she was a Monster Energy Grid Girl travelling the world to work at events such as Formula One, Rallycross and Moto GP.

Meanwhile fellow grid girl Izzy Beaumont has also used the job as a launchpad for TV jobs, appearing on Celebs Go Dating with Joey Essex and Calum Best, Britain's Flashiest Families and Supercars: The Million Pound Motors.

The move mirrors the Professional Darts Corporation's decision last week to end the long-established practice of women escorting male players to the stage and comes in the wake of the growing row over sexual harassment following accusations levelled at disgraced Hollywood film mogul Harvey Weinstein.

Love Island's Olivia Atwood had a three-year career as a pit girl before shooting to fame on the hit reality show