what was going on out there ?

hello


89-90-91 in those three years things were going mad in f1
and maybe it was the true start of the politics in f1 to
its highest point .

first why senna was DQ in japan after taking the win
was it a gift from balister who was french to prost
who is french as well ?

if its true then whu balister didnt take the title
from senna when he had admit that he has taken prost out on purpoe in 90 ?

how did senna escap punishment ?

and in ferrai camp was prost givin a better treatment than mansell or mansell was really out done although we should take in consideration that mansell had some races were he should or maybe was close to win ?

last thing did mansell deliberatly push prost out at the start of portugese gp ?

thanx

Politics and motorsport (and Formula One) have gone hand in hand since the 1930's. Internal politics was all over the 1980-81-82 seasons, much more so than the Senna-Prost years, and in it's own way more vicoius and certainly much more wide ranging as more than two drivers were involved.

Senna was disqualified after being push-started. A push-start is legal in cases where the car is in a dangerous position whih it was. However Senna did not rejoin the circuit once started. He shot cutted the chicane to rejoin the circuit. Because of the nature of the Suzuka chicane it was long been sacrosant 'do not even think about short-cutting the chicane'. He did and was dsq'ed for his troubles, giving Alessandro Nannini his only Grand Prix win.

As for Jean-Marie Balstre gifting the championship to Prost, it's a theory which has done the rounds more than a few times, especially with the contrived antics of recent years at second or third last races of the season which co-incidentally created last race title fights. Personally I don't think he did. Plus at the time Prost was not wonderfully enormoured with eing French. After he lost the 1983 World Championship he was pilloried by the French press, so he moved to Switzerland to get away from his homeland.

Balestre didn't take the title from Senna because the FIA tribunal had to do that. The tribunal was satisfoed with Senna's version of events at the time. 12 months later Senna public reversed that opinion. I believe because the offense took palce 12 months previous the FIA saw little to be gained by punishing Senna.

Prost was certainly better at Maranello politics than Mansell, but he was better than Mansell on the track too. If Mansell was better than Prost then the politics wouldn't have matterred. I doubt Mansell's move at Portugal was deliberate - a la Schumacher & Coulthard.

yours
Mark Jones

A big part of Prost's playing "Maranello politics" was simply a difference in work ethic. While Mansell was out playing golf and moaning to the British tabloids, Prost would be endlessly testing and debriefing with the Ferrari engineers and mechanics. Guess who ended up being regarded with more affection by the rank and file, those who actually did the dirty work of setting up and developing the cars? Winning the World Championship isn't solely a product of examining your motivation by sitting on the beach in Ibiza.