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  • PSA – Senna Week starts tonight on Sky
  • dannybgoode
    Full Member

    Can’t believe its 20 years since Imola. I can remember it like it was yesterday watching as it unfolded on TV.

    There look to be some very good programmes on Sky F1 and various bits and bobs on the F1 sites.

    Important not to forget Roland Ratzenberger either…

    back2basics
    Free Member

    senna docufilm this week on itv4 2200 may 4th

    20years…… still believe it was steering column failure…

    atlaz
    Free Member

    Important not to forget Roland Ratzenberger either…

    His family sent really lovely cards to people who sent condolences, even those who sent them over the internet (quite a new thing in 94). I still have mine somewhere.

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    andyl
    Free Member

    20 years…crikey. What have I done with my life over the last 20 years? Senna was my childhod hero, I bought tickets to go see him race at Silverstone that year. I never got to see him race in the flesh 🙁

    pondo
    Full Member

    20 years tomorrow since Ratzenberger’s crash then? Just thinking about that scene in the docufilm where it shows him talking to one of the team, and he’s saying something along the lines of he’s never driven like this before with a big smile on his face… Shivers down the spine.

    geoffj
    Full Member

    20 years, crikey!

    I remember the report referring to him as being either brain dead or clinically dead, and thinking what does that actually mean – oh, he’s actually dead.

    Greatest driver of his generation by a country mile, same as Schumacher and Vettel. Sad to think the state Schumi is in now too.

    gonzy
    Free Member

    ^^ +1

    Senna was my childhod hero

    mine too…the following day i went and bought a copy of each newspaper that reported on it (except the Sun)…still have them in a box in the loft i think…also had a seninha t-shirt and the senna s t-shirt. both have now been retired and put in frames….
    that season was the last one that i watched….its not the same without him.
    got the senna dvd at home still in the wrapper…i’ll have to make time to watch it this week

    geoffj
    Full Member

    got the senna dvd at home still in the wrapper…i’ll have to make time to watch it this week

    Do! It’s excellent.

    PJM1974
    Free Member

    I can’t believe it’s twenty years…that Imola weekend was just horrible.

    The accidents of Ratzenberger, Senna and the serious crash involving Barichello cast a shadow over the sport from that day on. The safety culture of the time had clearly become complacent, the change in regulations had resulted in cars that behaved unpredictably and the circuit design was equally unforgiving.

    pondo
    Full Member

    I remember that period with a sense of wounded disbelief – it was just unbelievable. Barrichelo’s crash was like “woo, close one! 🙂 “. Then Ratzenberger, and there was no humour about that. Then the startline crash, and a sense that, somehow, we’d got away with that one, and now we can have a great race. Then Senna.

    And somehow, even after all that, we go to the next race, Monaco, to try and lay the seeds of normality that will allow us to move on, and Wendlinger had his horror smash and was left in a coma. Just unbelievable, the whole thing. Was it Lauda who said “it was like god had his hand over formula one for twelve years, and that weekend he took it away”. Sounds about right to me.

    dragon
    Free Member

    Greatest driver of his generation by a country mile

    Except he wasn’t. Even if you don’t like Prost, to say Senna was a country mile better than him is simply balls.

    pondo
    Full Member

    Same with Schumi, really.

    geoffj
    Full Member

    Except he wasn’t. Even if you don’t like Prost, to say Senna was a country mile better than him is simply balls.

    I think we will have to agree to disagree on that one 😉

    pondo
    Full Member

    I think we will have to agree to disagree on that one

    Controversial! 🙂 I’m with dragon – there’s just nothing to say Senna was a mile better – better, you could argue. A country mile better? Nah.

    chewkw
    Free Member

    They are always the greatest when they are dead.

    Why do they have to be the greatest only in death?

    Can’t they be the, say, 4th greatest even in death?

    🙄

    dannybgoode
    Full Member

    Lets not fight about who was best Prost or Senna – both were incredible drivers for different reasons and most people have a preferred candidate for who was the best.

    There have been many great drivers over the years – some living, some unfortunately no longer with us.

    prawny
    Full Member

    I never liked Senna until he drove for williams, I wasn’t a Mclaren fan in general. I remember when the news reported that a formula 1 driver had been killed on the Saturday night I was sure it was Senna, I was relieved it wasn’t. It didn’t last long 🙁

    There’s a Ratzenberger documentary on SkyF1 this week at some point.

    back2basics
    Free Member
    Nobby
    Full Member

    Well at 6.40pm today it will have been exactly 20 years.

    Some of the stuff Sky have shown has been great – The Last Teammate was very good, taking Damon Hill & Mark Brabham back to Imola.

    Seems to be little coverage of his karting, FF & F3 racing though. His first FF win at Brands in the p*****g rain back in 1981 was phenomenal.

    Will be watching Senna tonight.

    Jamie
    Free Member

    Corinthians, Brazilian football team that Senna supported, came out in helmets as a sign of remembrance.

    ScottChegg
    Free Member

    Except he wasn’t. Even if you don’t like Prost, to say Senna was a country mile better than him is simply balls.

    He really was. He won 40% of all the races he started. Untouchable. No one else has not near those stats

    And schumacher only beat him when he was cheating.

    jonnouk
    Free Member

    Except he wasn’t. Even if you don’t like Prost, to say Senna was a country mile better than him is simply balls.

    Donington 93. With Senna in a 3rd rate car he pulls over 2 seconds a lap.

    PJM1974
    Free Member

    On the 1st May 1994 I’d been staying at a friend’s place and for reasons lost in time we turned on the television just as the medical team were working on Senna by the side of his car. Murray Walker’s calm and sombre narration will live with me for a long time yet.

    Anyway, last night I watched the Imola race in it’s entirety first time. It was an extremely difficult thing to see, knowing the outcome on lap six. Perhaps the most shocking aspect for me in the buildup to the race was the lack of runoff areas, a stricken car had nowhere to go except into the wall.

    And to think that were it not for a bent suspension pushrod, Senna may well have walked away from a bad accident…

    mrblobby
    Free Member

    Never liked Prost. Always seemed to be involved in a lot of political behind the scenes meddling to get his own way. Getting a clause in his contract preventing Senna being his team mate also doesn’t seem very sporting. Felt like Prost mostly won his races off the track.

    pondo
    Full Member

    Corinthians, Brazilian football team that Senna supported, came out in helmets as a sign of remembrance.

    I had a video that Duke did, A Star Called Ayrton Senna, that showed a clip of a heaving football stadium after the accident with, what, 60 000 people in it, all singing his name. Raises the hair on your arms.

    pondo
    Full Member

    He really was. He won 40% of all the races he started. Untouchable. No one else has not near those stats.

    He won 41 Grands Prix. He did a lot more than a hundred – was it a hundred and sixty or so?

    Or have I been fooled by the double negative in the second sentence…? Doh! 🙁

    dragon
    Free Member

    Well ignore the fact that Prost outscored Senna in both 1988 and 1989 in the same car. Regardless the below sums it up best.

    These two drivers were so closely matched, so exceptional but unfortunately so different in so many ways.

    pondo
    Full Member

    Never liked Prost. Always seemed to be involved in a lot of political behind the scenes meddling to get his own way. Getting a clause in his contract preventing Senna being his team mate also doesn’t seem very sporting.

    You hear that a lot, and I always think it’s pretty unfair – which of the greats DOESN’T do a load of work behind the scenes to get the team and suppliers onside? And when Senna went to Lotus )breaking his contract with Toleman, at the end of his first season in F1), he vetoed Derek Warwick (I think) as a team mate, because he didn’t think the team could run two cars at their best spec.

    jonnouk
    Free Member

    And when Senna went to Lotus )breaking his contract with Toleman, at the end of his first season in F1), he vetoed Derek Warwick (I think) as a team mate, because he didn’t think the team could run two cars at their best spec.

    and when he was trying to get a contract with Ferrari he wanted the fastes available driver to know he was getting the best from the car…

    http://www.gocar.gr/races/f1/12562,Ayrton_Senna_at_Ferrari_A_deal_that_was_.html

    pondo
    Full Member

    I have nothing to base this on, but that sounds… A bit dodge to me. He was laughing in 1990, Prost had left, Berger had come in, he had the whole team around him and the best car – why would he be looking to move to a team that hadn’t at that time won a title since 79? There’s a popular belief that Senna wanted to end his career at Ferrari, and I can believe he might have spoken to them but signing a letter of intent? Seriously?

    clubber
    Free Member

    For the record
    161 grand prix starts
    41 wins
    65 pole positions

    so that’s 25% wins and 40% poles

    Overall, he wasn’t a country mile better than Prost. On his day though he probably was (eg Monaco)

    As to the Ferrari thing, I remain unconvinced that it would have actually happened but I do believe he’d have given it serious consideration.

    mrblobby
    Free Member

    Wouldn’t be surprised if it was all contract negotiation shenanigans. Think letters of intent get signed and broken all the time when someone comes in with a better offer.

    he had the whole team around him and the best car – why would he be looking to move to a team that hadn’t at that time won a title since 79?

    What, like Schumacher did for $30 million a year 🙂

    clubber
    Free Member

    🙂 To be fair, Schumi turned out to be well worth that money at Ferrari.

    I think that Ferrari would have fitted in with his character and I reckon with a desire to create a legacy of some sort that would help him transition to politics in Brazil. Winning for Ferrari would been the icing on the cake.

    jonnouk
    Free Member

    I have nothing to base this on, but that sounds… A bit dodge to me. He was laughing in 1990, Prost had left, Berger had come in, he had the whole team around him and the best car – why would he be looking to move to a team that hadn’t at that time won a title since 79? There’s a popular belief that Senna wanted to end his career at Ferrari, and I can believe he might have spoken to them but signing a letter of intent? Seriously?

    Look up on youtube where Senna calls Prost a coward. He makes it known he was looking for a ride at Ferrari. The ’93 McLaren was inferior and was powered by a Ford v8 which was 80hp down on the Williams Renault and 35Hp down on the Ford V8 the Benetton had.

    MrSmith
    Free Member

    i was at McLaren HQ last week shooting the 650s and spent a few minutes looking at all the old GP cars they have there, amazing to see them up close but i never realised how fluro the marlboro cars were they just looked red on the tv.

    pondo
    Full Member

    What, like Schumacher did for $30 million a year

    Of course, these guys want to be paid what they think they’re worth and more, but I don’t think they would compromise their career just for money. The constructors titles for 91 and 96 would suggest that both of them made the right decision at the time –
    1991 constructors top 3
    1 McLaren-Honda 139
    2 Williams-Renault 125
    3 Ferrari 55.5

    1996 constructors top 3
    1 Williams-Renault 175
    2 Ferrari 70
    3 Benetton-Renault 68

    pondo
    Full Member

    Look up on youtube where Senna calls Prost a coward. He makes it known he was looking for a ride at Ferrari. The ’93 McLaren was inferior and was powered by a Ford v8 which was 80hp down on the Williams Renault and 35Hp down on the Ford V8 the Benetton had.

    I have no doubt at all that he was speaking to them by ’93 or even earlier, when he couldn’t get a Williams for ’93. But 1990, to drive for them in ’91? They didn’t win a race in ’91. And the McLaren might have had less power that Benetton’s factory HB, but I’m not sure you could say it was an inferior car, Donington being a case in point – that thing handled…

    jonnouk
    Free Member

    I’m not sure you could say it was an inferior car

    FW14B/FW15C

    pondo
    Full Member

    Who else?

    Why move? Around 1989/90?

    FW14B/FW15C

    Sorry, my bad – I meant in comparison to the Benetton. There was nowt like the Williams around.

    jonnouk
    Free Member

    I’ve realised i’ve got my years all mixed up. Prost was already in the Ferrari in ’90. Senna’s coward remark was in reference to Prost’s move to Williams. 😳

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