Indigenous teens given green light to be part of new motorsport career program

A motorsports program — believed to be the first of its kind in Australia — is aiming to gear up the first all-Indigenous racing car team.

Based out of a garage at Norwell Motorplex on Queensland’s northern Gold Coast, 10 Indigenous teenagers have been handpicked to take part in the Racing Together initiative.

The program is the brainchild of Formula One racing steward Garry Connelly, who is also Australia’s representative on the World Motor Sport Council.

“We realised that there’s little to no representation of our Indigenous people in motorsport in this country,” he said.

“We felt that it wasn’t going to happen organically, we’d have to do something proactive.”

Mr Connelly has taken the initiative and developed Racing Together, alongside Motorplex owner Paul Morris.

When the pair put the call out to Indigenous youths in the Logan city and southern Brisbane area, the interest was overwhelming.

“We had, I think, about almost 100 people register and we ran a couple of open days where we determined who was going to be a suitable candidate to join the team,” Mr Connolly said.

Options for a career in motorsports

Many of the Indigenous teenagers who applied had never even driven a car before.

As part of the selection process, they were asked to sit reaction tests, driving tests and simulation tests, to choose those with the most potential.

Braedyn Cidoni, 17, was picked as Racing Together’s first team driver.

“My whole life I’ve been around motorsport and the opportunity arose and I couldn’t be more excited to do it,” he said.

Mr Morris said while the driver usually got all the glory, each participant had a specific role in the pit crew.

Tristian Delaney, 17, will fill the role of team manager for the group’s first race meet in March.

Tristian also helped to build and road test the car the team would race in.

“Put the exhaust back on today, the other day we took off the alternator, so I’ve learnt a lot about cars since we’ve been here,” he said.

The aim is to instil life skills in the teens, while exposing them to various options for a career in motorsports.

“It’s given me a lot of skills of managing teams and managing stuff, especially going into a work career,” Tristian said.

Hope to expand program around Australia

Mr Morris said the motivation among the group had been building since they came together in September last year.

At this stage, the program is completely volunteer-based, but Mr Connolly hopes with additional funding the program could expand beyond Brisbane.

“Maybe to Townsville for a unit there, maybe the Northern Territory, Western Australia — in fact, in every state we’d like to see it eventually,” Mr Connolly said.