RACE OF HIS LIFE

TASSIE SPORT’S NEXT BIG THING IS STUCK IN THE PITS

THE Tasmanian motorsport ace touted as the next Daniel Ricciardo is on the brink of his career being cut brutally short.

Nine weeks on from a horror Formula 3 crash in the Italian Grand Prix, Alex Peroni is struggling to find the cash to get him racing again next season.

Peroni’s father Piero said the 19-year-old’s career “could well be over” if they can’t raise $1.5 million by the end of the year: “Our family is constantly on the precipice.”

TASMANIA’S Formula 1 hopeful Alex Peroni’s career is on the brink of being cut short.

Nine weeks on from a horror crash, Peroni’s Hobart family say they’re struggling to find the funding to pay for the damage to the car and the $1.5 million for Alex to race again next season.

The 19-year-old’s father Piero said Alex’s career was at its most critical crossroads.

“If we can’t find the right funding for him next year, I think Alex’s European career could well be over,” Mr Peroni said.

“If we had money right now, we would be sitting at the table and about to sign a contract with a team.

“We are sitting here in Tasmania and we don’t have the full funds.”

Alex’s dramatic airborne crash during the Formula 3 race at the Italian Grand Prix made headlines around the world and sent shockwaves through a sport that was reeling from the death a week before of Formula 2 driver Anthoine Hubert.

What saved Alex’s life was a device called a halo — a metal bar installed above the driver’s head — that was only made mandatory a year ago.

Alex said he only has one memory from after the crash: a single frame of some trees, then nothing.

He fractured his vertebra. It was his first serious injury since he started racing go karts in Hobart at the age of seven.

He is still wearing a neck brace, but is hopeful he might be able to start training again by mid December ahead of the new season’s trials starting in Europe in February.

First, though, his family need to find the money.

“People need to know that our family is constantly on the precipice,” Piero said.

“We are constantly about to slip over.”

But Alex is confident it will all work out.

“I’m used to doing it tough in motorsports,” he said. “Being in Tasmania I’ve always been behind the eightball.”

A fundraising dinner will be held next Friday at Wrest Point. Details at alex-peroni.com