Champney was born on 7 March 1909 in Scarborough. Her father, Colonel Frederick D'Arcy Champney, was described as a man of independent means, and the family's circumstances gave Dorothy access to motor sport at a relatively early age. Little is recorded of her formative years beyond her emergence as a competitive driver in the early 1930s.
The 1933 season marked Champney's breakthrough as a recognised competitor. Partnered with Miss L. Hobbs, she claimed the ladies award in the ladies prize at the International Alpine Cup, one of the most demanding and prestigious road events of the interwar era. That same year she became the first woman to compete in the Scottish Rally driving a Riley Kestrel. The Scottish Rally field that season was unusually large — nearly sixty class one entries — and roughly a third of those were women. Among the competitors Champney defeated were Jackie Astbury in a Singer and Marjorie Smith in an Alvis, demonstrating that her results represented real competitive merit rather than a participation category.
The high point of Champney's racing career came at the 1934 24 Hours of Le Mans. Paired with Kay Petre, another prominent British female racing driver of the period, Champney shared a Riley Ulster Imp. The combination was timed as the fastest car driven by women in that year's race, a significant achievement given the quality and number of works entries competing at La Sarthe. The 1934 Le Mans remains the best-documented moment of her motorsport career.
Later in 1934, Champney married Victor Riley, who at the time led the Riley Motor Company. The company had built the very cars — the Kestrel and the Ulster Imp — that she had raced to notable effect. The Riley business encountered severe financial difficulties through the latter half of the 1930s; the company was sold in 1938 and was eventually absorbed into the Morris Motor Company. Victor Riley remained a director of Morris from 1939 to 1948.
Dorothy and Victor had two children together. Despite stepping back from active competition following her marriage, she retained a lifelong interest in racing and automobiles. Dorothy Champney died on 22 July 1968 in Moreton-in-Marsh, having outlived her husband by just over ten years.
Champney's career illustrates the breadth of women's participation in international motor sport during the interwar years, a chapter of motorsport history that remains less documented than the male-dominated narrative of the same era. Her Le Mans result with Kay Petre stands as one of the more clearly attested female performances of the 1930s at the premier long-distance race.
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