Look at the news: terrorism, war, recession, cuts, "bunga-bunga" parties. What the world needs is an inspirational saga from which we can all draw comfort in these dark days. Happily, there's one on offer in this month's Grazia, courtesy of a three-page feature on the "seemingly unspoiled" 22-year-old Petra Ecclestone, and her triumph over adversity, armed only with pluck, determination and her father's estimated fortune of £1.466bn.
During this, the Formula One heiress categorically sets herself apart from the massed ranks of vacuous trustafarians by announcing that she had to buy a £56m Grade II-listed mansion in Chelsea because: "I need a garden for my dogs and there aren't many properties in Chelsea or Belgravia with a private garden." Luckily for Ecclestone: "My dad can afford to fund all this."
Alas, there are dark clouds on the horizon of her apparently charmed life. The renovation of the mansion is set to take two years, during which time she'll be forced to live in her £25m seven-bedroom mansion in Chelsea. Clearly a lesser soul would buckle under the stress, but they haven't been hardened by the seemingly unspoilt Petra Ecclestone's tough upbringing.
She was, she admits, subjected to a campaign of bullying at school. "They'd refuse to let me play hopscotch because my shoes were from Milan, instead of Russell & Bromley," she remembers. Before anybody asks some pressing questions (most notably, what kind of weird-ass school was this where children of hopscotch-playing age were apparently able to differentiate between shoes from Russell & Bromley and shoes from Milan?), she adds: "but while it made it harder to trust people, I think it's probably made me stronger."
Lost in Showbiz doesn't doubt that it has. It implores: seemingly unspoilt Petra Ecclestone! Why not take your tale of overcoming the hopscotch shoe-bullies around the failing schools of Britain? Show those kids what can be achieved simply with inner strength and the 24th richest man in Britain for a father. After all, it's not like you've got anything else on.
