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[mhferrari]

After more than 6 years, this article still makes me think:

HEADLINE: Ayrton Senna: The Last Hour
Motor Racing PUBLICATION DATE: 31 October 1994
BY: Andrew Longmore

The poem had been written that day and pinned on the fence alongside a bunch of flowers, heads bowed in the rain. Per Roberta ed Ayrton, September 1st, 1994. The wall on the far side of the track had been painted battleship grey, but an ugly, diagonal gash betrayed the force with which Senna's spinning Williams had rammed it four months before.


``Ciao, Ayrton'' read a message daubed in blood red on the concrete. The thunder and rain echoed the storm which had broken the night after Senna's death and sharpened the sense of foreboding. The Tamburello Curve at Imola, flanked by tall trees and high fencing, is a forbidding, joyless and lonely shrine.


My journey to a bleak corner of an Italian motor racing circuit on a dismal September morning was driven partly by gratitude, partly by curiosity. I wanted to see where a great champion had died and pay tribute to his brilliance. Senna, 34, had been the Formula One world champion three times, won 41 of his 161 grands prix, claimed a record 65 pole positions and set 19 fastest laps.


The Brazilian's greatness transcended the ordinary boundaries of sport and nationality, race and creed. He was Brazil's pulse, but he was everyone's hero, a man who controlled life in a way not open to ordinary mortals and whose death brought mortality a step closer for a generation. I also wanted to chart Senna's emotional course through that turbulent weekend. Tamburello, where a steady trickle of visitors come to stare at the wall and leave flowers, keepsakes and flags, seemed a good place to start.


Even before the death of Roland Ratzenberger made him realise for the first time the true price of his profession, Senna faced enormous pressures at Imola. He was adjusting to a new team, a difficult car and a different routine. At McLaren, he had been treated like the only son in a big family; at Williams, he was the newest employee in a successful business. There was no time to settle in: Senna and Williams were expected to win immediately. Yet they had not scored a point in the first two races and Senna was convinced that Michael Schumacher, who had won both, was driving an illegal car. But Senna, the master psychologist, could control those forces and turn them into challenges.


Ratzenberger's death was different. It was uncontrollable, beyond comprehension and Senna, who regarded himself as the guardian of the close-knit community of Formula One drivers, took it personally. Senna had outlined plans for an independent commission to oversee safety at the end of 1993, but shelved them because of the two-race suspended ban hanging over him. In the last 24 hours of his life, he began to renew the crusade almost as if he was trying to atone for not doing more.


Contrary to his reputation, Senna had known fear, but, with the help of his faith and his intellect, he had rationalised it into an unnerving force. He spoke eloquently and coolly about needing to explore his limits every time he stepped into a racing car. But he had never known doubt: about his own abilities, about the meaning of the sport which was his life, about his own mortality and his own beliefs. Senna was sensitive, gentle, thoughtful, courageous, intelligent, loyal, honest, humble. He was also temperamental, arrogant, ruthless, single-minded, opinionated, obstinate and possessed of a frightening will to win. Ratzenberger's death brought the halves of his character into insoluble conflict. Senna knew he had to win at Imola to resist Schumacher's charge and restore some credibility. He also knew instinctively that he did not want to race. If he had won the opening two races of the season, he might have considered withdrawing. He was, according to some reports, given the option to do so. But to pull out of this race would have been an irreversible sign of weakness and he would not contemplate it. His belief that Ratzenberger had been killed instantly and that, therefore, under Italian law, the track should have been closed reflected his desperate search for a way out of the emotional impasse.


Those close to Senna refuse to believe that he could have made a mistake at a curve as straightforward as Tamburello. Blaming a machine is far less complicated, though the hints of vulnerability only enhance the man. The results of an investigation into his death by the University of Bologna, due any day, will reveal some of the truth. Not all. That Sunday morning, Senna's mind was still in freefall, full not of premonition of his own death but of a terrible uncertainty.


Without him, the season has spun crazily on through rancour, suspicion, suspension and argument. But you do not have to scratch the tough skin of Formula One hard to draw blood. ``I still cannot believe I will not see him, walking down the paddock with his yellow helmet,'' Jo Ramirez, Senna's closest friend at McLaren, said. For him and a million others, the season was defined for eternity on the afternoon of May 1.


Thursday April 284pm: The helicopter carrying Ayrton Senna to the San Marino Grand Prix landed on the infield at the Imola circuit. With Senna were the president of Ducati, the firm making the Senna motorbike, and the chief executive of TAG-Heuer, who was masterminding the production of a Senna watch.


The Brazilian's plane, an eight-seat British Aerospace HS125, had been taken by Owen O'Mahony, his personal pilot, straight to the little airfield at Forli. The landing fees were cheaper there than at Bologna and Senna, for all his millions, was not one to throw money away. Senna had been in Padua in the morning, launching a Senna mountain bike, but he wanted to see his Williams team before going on to the hotel. He checked on the car's preparations and talked to Richard West, director of marketing for Williams, about his promotional commitments.


5 pm: Senna arrived at the Castello, a small hotel run by the jovial Valentino Tosoni, on the outskirts of Castel San Pietro, a spa town about 10 kilometres west of Imola. The Castello was the McLaren team's hotel and Senna had stayed there for the San Marino Grand Prix since 1989. He always booked the same room, No200, a junior suite costing Pounds 150 a night consisting of a bedroom, a bathroom and a small sitting-room and he was not going to change his habits just because he had changed teams.


Frank Williams, the team managing director, occupied the room below, but most of the team stayed elsewhere. Ron Dennis, Senna's old boss at McLaren, was in the room above. Senna knew Tosoni well and Tosoni understood the routine of his most famous client. He had already ordered extra supplies of profiteroles, Senna's favourite dessert.


Senna travelled light to races. He did not need a vast entourage but liked to relax with friends away from the track. That weekend he was accompanied by his brother, Leonardo, Julian Jakobi, his business manager, Antonio Braga, an old friend from Brazil, Galvao Bueno, a journalist with Brazil's TV Globo, one of the few journalists Senna trusted, Celso Lemos, managing director of Senna Licensing in Brazil, Josef Leberer, his physio and dietician, and Ubirajara Guimaraes, the head of Senna Imports. It was a bigger party than usual.


The one notable absentee was Adriane Galisteu, Senna's girlfriend and, according to many, his future wife, who had become an increasingly familiar figure at the racetrack but who was not returning to Faro, Senna's European base, until late the next day after finishing an English course in Brazil. Mindful perhaps of Leonardo and the delicate relationships with his family and of the importance of the weekend to his chances of a fourth world championship, Senna had decided she should stay in Portugal. Senna dined in the hotel that evening steak, pasta, profiteroles and mineral water was the standard menu and returned to his room at about 10pm, his usual curfew hour during race meetings. He rarely went to bed before midnight, but was a notoriously late riser.


Friday April 299.30am: Free practice, timed but not counting towards qualifying, began. Senna completed 22 laps, recording a fastest time of 1min 21.598sec, more than a second faster than his team-mate, Damon Hill.


1.14pm: Fourteen minutes into the first qualifying session, Senna completed the fastest lap. Moments later, as he was returning to the pits, the Jordan of Rubens Barrichello hit the kerb in the middle of the 140mph Variante Bassa chicane, hurtled through the air, cleared a metre-high tyre barrier and smashed against a debris fence. The crash looked horrific, reminiscent of Gerhard Berger's five years before, and it stunned Senna, who regarded Barrichello as his heir, the keeper of the tradition of great Brazilian racing drivers.


There are conflicting reports about Senna's immediate reaction. Senna did not see the accident himself but sent Betise Assumpcao, his personal assistant, to the Jordan pits to find out more. Owen O'Mahony, Senna's pilot who happened to be in the pits, thought that Senna had gone straight to the medical centre. Senna certainly went to the centre. Finding the front door blocked, he vaulted a fence to get in the back. Barrichello, who regained consciousness minutes after the accident, found Senna looking over him. ``The first face I saw was Ayrton's,'' Barrichello recalled later. ``He had tears in his eyes. I had never seen that with Ayrton before. I just had the impression he felt as if my accident was like one of his own.'' The tears were the first of many that weekend, but within minutes Senna was back in the cockpit.


1.40pm: The qualifying session resumed. Senna bettered his time immediately and just before the close set what was to prove the quickest time of the weekend, a lap of 1min 21.548sec at an average of 138.2mph. The lap, in a car still unfamiliar to him and in the emotional aftermath of Barrichello's crash, was an emphatic reminder of Senna's supreme skill and courage.


But there was already a fragment of evidence that Senna was not as single-minded as usual. Walking past the Williams garage during practice, O'Mahony was surprised to hear Senna call him. ``Owen, I have something for you,'' Senna said, diving into his briefcase and producing three signed photographs of himself with O'Mahony. ``That was odd,'' O'Mahony said. ``I had been meaning to ask him for the pictures for a long time, but never got around to it. He had made a particular point of doing them for me anyway. The other odd thing was that he gave them to me in the middle of testing. It was all so out of character for him to think about anything other than racing. It was almost as if he wanted to tie up some loose ends.''


Senna was not happy with his car. He had a long and animated discussion with his race engineer, David Brown, and later that afternoon, having arranged to meet a small group of journalists to talk about his business interests, cut short the interview because of a ``big engineering problem'' with the car.


Mark Fogarty of Carweek magazine, a well-known figure in Formula One, was one of the group. He recalled: ``I was struck at the time by how much effort he had to make to focus on our questions. If Senna agreed to do an interview, he would always give it his full attention. Sometimes, he even took so long answering a question you wondered if he had heard it, but he was simply thinking about the implications. This time, he just wasn't focused. His answers were halting and he looked glazed as if he was mentally worn out.''


After 20 minutes, Senna left to talk to Brown again. The journalists waited for an hour, but when Senna came back he postponed the rest of the interview until after qualifying the next day. He was too tired, he said, and it was too late.


After leaving the circuit at 8pm, Senna dined at the Trattoria Romagnola, a small restaurant in Castel San Pietro, where his regular menu was antipasta, Parma ham, tagliatelle with a plain tomato sauce and fruit. He took no coffee, no alcohol, and liked his mineral water carbonated and slightly warm. He returned to his room just after 11pm.


Saturday April 309.30am:


During the second free practice session, Senna completed 19 laps with a best time of 1min 22.03sec. At 1pm, the second qualifying session started.


1.18pm: Almost 24 hours to the minute after Barrichello's breathtaking escape, Formula One's 12-year run of good luck ran out. Unlike the Brazilian, Roland Ratzenberger, the popular Austrian, had no chance of survival. Witnesses said his Simtek car took off and hurtled at a speed of almost 200mph into a concrete retaining wall on the outside of the Villeneuve curve before careering back into the middle of the track. Ratzenberger suffered massive injuries and was taken to the medical centre before being flown to Bologna's Maggiore Hospital.


2.15pm: The death of Ratzenberger was confirmed, the first at a grand prix since Ricardo Paletti was killed at Montreal in 1982. Drivers know when accidents look bad and Senna, who had seen it on the monitor as he prepared to go out in the Williams, went straight to the back of the garage and covered his face with his hands. He feared the worst and went to see for himself. Hurrying down the pit lane, he commandeered a safety car and drove down through the Tamburello Curve to the scene of the accident.


He arrived just after the Austrian had been taken to the medical centre, but saw the debris scattered over the track, the car twisted and lifeless. Having driven back to the pits, Senna went to find Professor Sid Watkins, the head of the international motor sport federation (FIA) medical commission. He wanted further news. Despite an age difference of more than 30 years, Senna and Watkins had forged a firm friendship. It was Watkins's grim task to tell Senna of Ratzenberger's death, the first in Formula One for 186 grands prix. Watkins recalled Senna's reaction. ``He was very shocked. He had never faced the reality of his profession before so starkly because no one had been killed during his time in Formula One. He was always fatalistic about death; he was a religious man and intelligent enough to think it through.


This was the first time it had come so close. He was very quiet, but he remained resolute, not questioning out loud the meaning of his sport or his own position.'' Watkins and Senna talked for about five minutes. In the meantime, Martin Whitaker, the press officer of the FIA, had also gone to the medical centre for further news of Ratzenberger. He saw Watkins and Senna talking and hung back. ``When they had finished, I asked Senna if he knew what had happened. He didn't reply. He just looked at me and walked away,'' Whitaker said. ``I won't forget the look. To say it was fear would be over the top. He was just very worried. There was something different about him. You can see it in the photos of him that weekend.''


When the qualifying session was resumed, Senna had no appetite for racing. Williams withdrew and he went back to the motorhome where he was left alone with Damon Hill and Hill's wife, Georgina. Betise Assumpcao was also there for a time. ``His spirits were so low. I just stroked his head, talked to him a little, but he was very quiet,'' she recalled. Hill has never confirmed reports that Senna broke down and had to be calmed by him but Frank Williams was concerned enough about Senna's emotional state to ask for a meeting with him later in the evening. He checked with Assumpcao how Senna was. Meanwhile Senna declined to attend the traditional pole position winner's press conference. He should have been fined, but Whitaker advised that no action should be taken. His advice was heeded.


3 pm: Senna was called from the motorhome to attend a meeting of the race stewards. The stewards wanted to reprimand Senna for taking an official car to the scene of Ratzenberger's crash. Senna was in no mood to accept the censure of the FIA and the race director, John Corsmit.


Corsmit's point was legitimate. He said that Senna should not have taken a car without permission, however extreme the circumstances. Senna, still emotional, replied that he represented all the drivers, was a three-times world champion and concerned about Ratzenberger and about the safety of the track. He had also, he pointed out, got the permission of a pit-lane official before getting into the car. The exchange was highly charged, with Senna at one point shouting: ``At least someone is concerned about safety.''


Corsmit, an old but respected adversary of Senna's, took no further action. He thought the Brazilian was not himself the whole weekend. ``He seemed bothered by lots of other things.'' Senna was certainly too upset to continue his interview from the previous evening or to pose with the bride and groom when he returned to the Castello to find a wedding reception in full swing.


The strain on his face and his manner struck Fogarty so forcefully, almost four hours after Ratzenberger's death, he told colleagues that night that he felt Senna had a sense of foreboding. ``I know you can look back and make sense of a lot of things,'' Fogarty said. ``But I just got the impression he had a really bad feeling about it. He just looked dreadful.'' Senna agreed to complete the interview by phone later in the week.


Senna called Galisteu twice that night, the first time before dinner. He told her that he did not feel like racing the next day, but said nothing about fears for his own life. He felt it would be morally wrong to race. ``He was shaken. Crying, really crying,'' she said. ``He told me he did not want to race. He had never spoken like that.''


Galisteu told Senna he did not have to race. Senna said he had to, it was his job. Later, after a dinner at the Romagnola which was planned as a celebration of Josef Leberer's birthday but was, in the words of Julian Jakobi, a ``sombre affair'', Senna found the message from Frank Williams and went to see him in his room. According to the Williams team, Senna seemed much calmer and more positive than he had been in the afternoon and confirmed that he would be ready to drive the next day. He also called Galisteu again, sounding, she recalled, in far better spirits. Senna said he was going to race, but that he couldn't wait for the whole thing to be over. His last words to her were: ``Come and pick me up at Faro airport at 8.30pm tomorrow. I can't wait to see you.''


Sunday May 17.30am: Senna was woken by a familiar voice on the telephone. ``Baggage service''. It was O'Mahony, wanting to know what time to pick up the bags from the hotel. He also acted as Senna's early morning alarm call. Senna flew by helicopter to the track and was comfortably fastest in the morning warm-up session. He told David Brown not to change anything on the car. He also recorded a televised lap for TF1, the French television network, for whom Alain Prost was working. ``I would like to say welcome to my old friend, Alain Prost,'' Senna said over the radio. ``Tell him we miss him very much.'' As the pair had been long-standing enemies and had barely spoken to each other for several years, the olive branch was quite unexpected. Prost was deeply touched and the pair talked ``really talked'' Prost said for a long time in the paddock that day.


Senna wanted the Frenchman to become involved in the safety commission. Prost agreed that they would meet before the Monaco Grand Prix two weeks later. Senna also talked intensely to Niki Lauda, another three-times world champion, that morning, enlisting the Austrian's help too.


11 am: Senna went with Gerhard Berger, his old McLaren team-mate, to the drivers' briefing. The meeting was short, but animated. The drivers stood in silence for a minute in memory of Ratzenberger. Senna was particularly concerned about the use of the pace car on the warm-up lap. The car had been used for the first time at the Pacific Grand Prix in Japan two weeks earlier to keep the field bunched before the start. Senna said the car did not go fast enough to get the tyres properly warmed up and, along with Berger, proposed that it should not be used again. He was also worried that the safety car, brought out to slow the race in the event of an accident, would also not be fast enough. From the drivers' meeting, Senna went to the Williams hospitality area where, in a well-rehearsed show, he and Hill entertained the Williams guests with a corner-by-corner commentary on the track and a few comments about the weekend. Senna had not wanted to go, but knew promotion was part of the job.


12 pm: Senna began his preparations for the race. Usually, he ate a light lunch, then shut himself away to gather his thoughts. Often, at McLaren, he would turn the driving seat of the motorhome round and read his bible. He had his bible in his briefcase that weekend, but nobody saw whether he read it that morning.


1.30pm: Half an hour before the start, Senna went to the Williams garage. Jaime Brito, a Brazilian journalist, was with Senna in the garage and asked him to sign three pictures. It was the first time he had asked Senna for an autograph. ``The photos were so sad. I remarked about it at the time,'' he said. In Brazil, the images of Senna, the people's hero, the symbol of Brazilian nationhood, looking gaunt and pale, were to shock and haunt the nation for weeks. ``He did something that day I had never seen him do before,'' Brito recalled. ``He walked round the car, looked at the tyres, rested on the rear wing, almost as if he was suspicious of the car.''


His manner was also different. Betise Assumpcao recalled: ``He usually had a particular way of pulling on his balaclava and helmet, determined and strong as if he was looking forward to the race. That day, you could tell just from the way he was putting on his helmet that he didn't want to race. He was not thinking he was going to die, he really thought he would win that race, but he just wanted to get it over with and go home. He wasn't there, he was miles away.'' He also broke his usual routine on the starting grid by taking his helmet off. While most other drivers get out of their cars on the grid, waiting for the start, once in the car Senna almost always stayed in the cockpit, concentrating on the first corner. Assumpcao was more assured by the look in Senna's eyes moments before the start.


2 pm: The starting light turned green and the cars, headed by Senna, streamed into the first turn. But there was trouble on the grid. Pedro Lamy's Lotus slammed into the back of JJLehto's Benetton which had stalled on the start line, scattering debris all over the track. A wheel flew over the debris fencing injuring nine people.


2.03pm: The safety car came out as the debris was cleared. Senna followed at a respectful distance, with Michael Schumacher, Berger and Hill behind him.


2.15pm: The Williams pit radioed to Senna that the safety car was about to pull off. Senna acknowledged the information. It was the last contact. When the race began again, Senna and Schumacher quickly opened a gap on the rest of the field.


2.17pm: Taking the Tamburello Curve for the second time after the restart, Senna's Williams veered off the track just after the apex of the bend at a speed of 190mph and slammed into an unprotected concrete retaining wall. The front right side of the car took the full brunt of the impact, a wheel flew off, the suspension crumpled and the Williams catapulted back onto the track. In the split second before the car hit the wall, Senna had managed to slow it to 130mph. The monocoque had stayed intact and a slight movement of Senna's head gave brief cause for hope. But he had suffered massive head injuries. Aerial pictures of the car, blood seeping from it like oil, were seen by millions of television viewers. Senna was lifted from the wreckage and taken by helicopter to the Maggiore Hospital. On board, doctors fought to revive Senna's heart.


2.55pm: Thirty-seven minutes after Senna's crash, the race was restarted. Berger led for the first 11 laps before pitting and retired on lap 14. He went straight to the hospital. In Faro, Galisteu had seen the accident on television and, for an instant, was pleased because Senna would be home early. She soon realised the full horror and was called by Luiza Braga, Antonio's wife, who had arranged a plane to fly them both to Senna's bedside. The journey was in vain. The plane turned back soon after leaving Faro.


4.20pm: Schumacher crossed the line to win his third successive grand prix. Soon after, electrical brain tests confirmed that Senna was brain dead and being kept alive only by artificial means. Under Italian law, doctors are not allowed to turn off the machines for 12 hours. But even this support proved insufficient.


6.40pm: The chief medical officer, Dr Maria Theresa Fiandri, pronounced Ayrton Senna dead.


Back at the track, in the shattered remains of Senna's car, they discovered a furled Austrian flag Senna had intended to dedicate his 42nd grand prix victory to Ratzenberger's memory.


-- This article is copyright 1994 The London Times.

[aRTi]

I will never forget Roland's death…

[Wolf]

I think the article is pretty good but it leaves me with uneasy feeling. I don't know whether it is trying to leave impression as he felt he was going to die, but in that light one might read into it that he was not his usual himself and therefore did not react as he could or should have done. And I don't like it; to me he seemed to be a passenger in a projectile from the moment he hit brakes on. He may have been reflective, who wouldn't be after all that's happened that weekend, but the car failed him and it's as simple as that.
BTW, AFAIK, the last interview that weekend he gave to Croatian TV, which was broadcasted before the race. And I remember that they 'claimed' it as the last Senna's interview.

[Williams]

I must admit after initially glancing at the post, I thought "why are we rehasing this again ?" Now, after having read it, I can only say "thanks, mh, for posting it".

As for the impression of Senna having a premonition about his death, I can only say that I have had an experience with someone close just prior their untimely and unexpected end, and the same thing: small actions taken which seemed slightly odd at the time, but which afterwards very much gave the impression of loose ends being tied up...

[Zawed]

A very moving article....makes you think a little about the what the drivers feel about the danger inherent in their sport.

[The Swerve]

I never knew about the Austrian Flag.

The amazing thing about Senna is that he can still evoke emotion 6 years after his death.

[NYR2119935]

[Chris G.]

Ugh.

[David J Jones]

I will always remember at 1.57 seeing Senna in his car on the grid and wondering if it could happen .......

And I was never a Senna supporter.........

[mhferrari]

If I was Michael Schumacher and got my 42nd win. When I crossed the finish line, sort of like Senna would have done, I would have waved both the Brazilian flag and Austrian flag. Because that is what Ayrton would do on his 42nd win. You could call it many things, I would call it closure.[p][Edited by mhferrari on 11-05-2000]

[The Swerve]

That's not really Schueys style though is it? And I don't mean that in a mean way, just that Michael is very focused on his own racing. Y'know?

[mhferrari]

I could actually see Schumacher doing it, but it was probably too long after the incident.

[senninha]

"Racing, competing ... is in my blood. It's a part of me."

[molive]

Many things have been said and written in the past 6 years about Senna. But it's the first time I read a hour-hour account of Senna's last weekend (thanks, mhferrari).

I guess many posters here are just too young to understand the whole Senna Legend thing. One thing is to read about AS, but to see his whole F1 career develop (like I did) gives you a slightly different view of the subject. He was, like the text says, an Idol. But he more than that: he was the very best.



Anyway, here's something for Frans:

Senna and Williams were expected to win immediately. Yet they had not scored a point in the first two races and Senna was convinced that Michael Schumacher, who had won both, was driving an illegal car.

[westendorf]

Sempre SENNA!

[pRy]

Originally posted by David J Jones
I will always remember at 1.57 seeing Senna in his car on the grid and wondering if it could happen .......

And I was never a Senna supporter.........

I hated Senna with a vengence, ever since F1 was Mansell -v- Senna, I didnt like him, I refused to admit he was the best(I was a Mansell supporter). Then, at Imola.. when he was sitting in his car, with his fire proof thing on his head, I thought to myself "This guy is the best", first time id openly admitted to it, id never thought it before, but at Imola I just found myself thinking it. This sounds very much like the sort of odd thought you had. Very spooky how Senna sitting in his car had this sort of effect on quite a few people, because I know from talking to others they had simular feelings.

[pRy]

Originally posted by mhferrari
I could actually see Schumacher doing it, but it was probably too long after the incident.

I think Barrichello at Germany was the best way F1 could have remembered Senna since 1994, he did him proud.

[Ray Bell]

It's a shame, to those who know Fogarty, that he has been quoted here. He is such a sensationalist, a superficial type, very short on brain.
But the story is absorbing.

[Bruce]

Good post Mh....

It's a funny thing though, observing Senna's last days in such minute detail, knowing the outcome as we do... in fiction, there is a device called "foreshadowing" in which a character gives an indcation of an outcome (usually disasterous) and then tells the story of what leads up to it - this impregnates every action leading to the "climax" with extra meaning, with a sort of pathos given that we possess knowledge the protagonist does not at the time.

This is the case in this article and much of what I have read about Senna in his last days.

As much as I appreciate your placing this Mh, I have to say that I think that it is overblown. Senna may have not been himself (who would be in that situation?) but his death was a tragic fluke. Had he not died, no one would be talking about the poignant incidents that led up to the race, they would be talking about his guts for coming back next race from what looked like a bad accident - about how he is the best driver in the world for winning his 4th WDC despite his rocky start with Williams.

But he died. Did he make a mistake? If he did, it would not be his first ever. Regardless, he was not killed because he went off the track - the impact was survivable. What was not was the suspension piece that pierced his helmet. The suggestion that he had a foreshadowing of his own death is to my mind ludicrous. It was, as I say, a tragic fluke, and in it's wake we have attached great meaning to his every action prior to it. Thus his unhappiness about racing in light of the events that weekend take on a grimmer aspect in the long shadow cast by his death that day.

Senna is not the only one subject to this...

After Greg Moore's death, there was, amongst the tears and tributes a small number of people who were suddenly experts on GM, saying "Yup, I knew it was gonna happen - he drove to hard all the time... " -perfect examples of 20/20 hindsight. The attribute that made most of us admire Moore suddenly became (for some) the tragic flaw that lived within him that would inevitably have led to his premature demise.

Read Nigel Roebuck's Driver Profile book on Gilles Villenueve and you will again read some of the same foreshadowing techniques that were employed in the above article...

My point?

To take an accurate picture of Senna's last hours, one must do it in a vacuum, unaware, as he was, that events were about to overtake him. By examining him as we do with our knowledge of what transpired, we attempt to rationalise his actions prior to his death with the certain knowledge he was about to die, and by doing so, it follows that we view each action he took in context ONLY to his own impending death.

It is HIGHLY unlikely that Senna got into his car, thinking "I'm going to die today..." . He may have been less confident than usual owing to the circumstances, but knowing of Senna what I know, I find it hard to believe that he was not looking far beyond the race, and foocusing, as always, on the future, and the next goal whatever that was...

[RedFever]

Quite frankly, I agree with ray. While the article is trying to get under your skin and shows the more human side of Ayrtone which was most of the time precluded to the audience, I hated the article. I hated it like I hate anything that somehow uses the death of a man, or an idol, as some keep calling him, to create some sensationalism. The various references that want to suggest Ayrton had premonitions, like signing autographs without being asked, etc, are pittiful.

It's clear that Ayrton was shaken and didn't want to race. Nothing surprising, Regazzoni and Lauda didn't want to race either after Peterson's crash in 78. He had never witnessed a death in F1 and clearly it touched him. But Ayrton was also the extremist professional. Therefore, he placed his feeling on the side and accepted that he was a racing driver and his job was to race. For the journalist to suggest, imply, speculate that Ayrton was distracted, had premonitions of his own mortality, and create a creepy sense of Senna sensing what was coming, it's pretty pathetic. Ayrton, like any great driver, the moment he decided he was going to race, the moment he lower his helmet and strapped his belts and started his engine, was entirely focused on driving. The accident that claimed his life had nothing to do at all with anything that happened on Friday or Saturday. A mechanical failure on his Williams caused him to lose control of the car the same way any of the other 23 drivers would have lost it. It was just a dramatic coincidence that Ayrton died that weekend, but it was just that: a coincidence in a part failing while the driver was completly focused on keeping the lead.

[Simioni]

I don't really believe Senna had premonitions of his own death, but it was clear he was far from being his own self not only during the GP meeting, but for the whole of that last week. I have on tape that moment in which Senna is resting over the rear wing, and the look he had in his eyes is just impossible to describe.

[RedFever]

To Bruce's point:

I was speechless when i read comments from journalists that only a few months back had written how "Gilles' superior talent, a class of his own, always prevented him from getting hurt in accidents", after Zolder, the same jackalls were writing how "Gilles had been a serious accident waiting to happen". And down with the creepy details fo his last day, his disaapointment with Didier, the legend that he felt personally challenegd by the fact that Didier was ahead of him that Saturday and his desperate attempt to place the French behind him, he took crazy chances that killed him.

How little these idiots knew Gilles. Gilles was certainly aware that Pironi was ahead of him. But so were 6 other drivers. And tha's all there is. Gilles gave 110% of himeslef each and every of the 67 GPs he raced. Always at the limit, always full speed. That day in Zolder he didn't do anything different from the usual: give it all, try his best at all costs. When I saw him leave the pits, it was the usual smoking screeking tires he always had. It happened, Mass closed his ideal line and Gilles had no time left to react to it. He died, but he had died in a coincidence situation, like it really is the case most of the time. To suggest that a driver of his caliber was thinking only about Didier and for that he paid the final prize, it's similar to this article suggesting Senna had a sense of what was coming. He didn't, otherwise he would have not raced and would have not bothered having an Austrian flag with him, which he never had a chance to use.

[RedFever]

Simioni, again, that was the look on pretty much most of the drivers. I have the tapes from Monza 1978 (I was at the race, but my mom taped it for me). Hunt, Lauda, Andretti, they were all stunned. Clay Regazzoni went mad, grabbed Bernie and started screaming at him "where is the ****ing doctor that you make us all pay for?". The entire scne was part madness at first, and then you could see horror, fear, disbelief on the driver's face. Carlos Reutemann was pale like a ghost. He had been involved in the accident (probably Hunt or Peterson, after their contact, hit Carlos behind and sent him in a spin) and probably for the first time realised how close he had been to death, the guy next to him a few seconds before, was lieing now on the floor unconscious.

Well, they all picked up their pieces and raced. The moment a driver gets to racing again, it means he capable of doing so. Senna had way too much experience to underestimate his situation. He was stressed, he was touched. But ultimately, he managed to get the focus he needed (fastest during warmup). His death was not the consequence of the weekend. It was a mechanical failure. That's all there is to it. A broken part in his Williams and nothing he could to to avoid the crash. The sooner we accept this, the less speculation on his death there will be.

[BuzzingHornet]

Seems that everyone has a story to tell regarding Senna's last days. This is an interesting piece, and it reminds me of Sid Watkins' version in his autobiography (I think its called Life on the Limit) where he described how Senna told him he didn't want to race, and how Sid knew instinctively that there'd been a big crash at Tamburello even before he'd seen it... wierd stuff.

I personally think that Senna had never really faced up to the dangers until Ratzenberger, but it seemed that he was suddenly thinking of retirement and maybe that tipped the balance. Whatever, from what people say, it seems that for whatever reason he wasn't himself on race day. My personal opinion is that the safety car being out lowered his ride hieght, and his mind wandered and he lost it on a bump (the bumps that he was running over that he warned Hill to avoid)

My opinion, thats all.

[Simioni]

Right Red, as I said I dont believe in this story about premonitions, but there are so many things from Senna that last week, a lot of things that had nothing to do with his usual behavior. It really gives the impression he was urgent to tie some loose ends. It might be just coincidence, but who is to know?

[Simioni]

Buzzing,

I dont buy the tire pressure theory, simply because Senna had already gone flat out through tamburello the lap before, when the temperatures were even lower. Sure there was a lot of bottoming, but there was no signs of lift. If you look at the onboard shot of that last lap, it was pretty hard pace. I think the tires were fuly able to handle tamburello the following lap.

[BuzzingHornet]

I think in times of tragedy you feel your own mortality, maybe Roland's death reminded him to look around at other people, hence the autographs, comments etc. It wasn't a premonition of death, just a tragedy coming coincidentally on the back of another tragedy.

Simioni, didn't Schumacher say that he saw Senna bottoming out at Tamburello? Yeah I don't think Senna would lift anyway as it was a flat corner then, but he nearly lost it apparently on the previous lap...[p][Edited by BuzzingHornet on 11-06-2000]

[RedFever]

BH, i totally disagree with your tire theory. Sorry, but Ayrton was not an idiot, he would have not forgotten the "bumps", it comes instinctive to a driver, particularly one who noticed the problem first.

No, i saw many times the video of Ayrton's crash from Schumi's camera. Had Ayrton made a msitake or had the tires got softer (why of all drivers only Ayrton's tires??? why he went flat out the lap before and nothing happened? one full lap of imola flat out is enough to bring the tires at optimal temperature), he would have lost the car differently. The car just changed direction once Ayrton had already directed it the right way. The only problem could have come by losing the rear (very hard that would happen, as Alesi said "If you drove an F1, Tamburello is not a turn, it's a flat out straight. Nobody in F1 would go out there unless there is a mechanical problem"), instead Ayrton's car suddenly changed direction frontally, as if the driver had suddendly decided to drive into the wall (which of course we know it's not true, from the images from Ayrton's cockpit, where we him desperatly trying to counteract the change in direction in the last 2 seconds of his life). His car failed him, there is no way in hell a driver of his talent would fail such a simple turn with an F1, particularly the best driver in F1

[BuzzingHornet]

Hill said that he was surprised to see Senna using the bumps though, after he had warned Hill to stay away from them. But thats 2nd hand information, I don't know he used them for sure.

Another possibility is debris; there was a photo of Benetton debris on the track from the Lehto crash, and Senna appeared to run over it.

RedFever, were you at Zolder when GV crashed??

[RedFever]

thank God no. RAI had live qualyfing already back then and had their own cameras right on the circuit and their own interviewer (Zermiani, a good old firnd of Piquet, who would always sabotage his equipment during a live interview). So, they had waited for Gilles to get back out, since the session was lamost over. And their cameraman and Zermiani were right there at the Ferrari pit. Gilles briefly communicated to his engineer, then they showed a full image of his head, his concentrated look, and then he left with smoke and all. They then switched to the Belgian cameras on the circuit that were following the drivers along the circuit. I remember clearly bitching about the fact they were following other cars and I figured by then Gilles must have completed his warmup lap and was already full speed. So, i was cursing the director to show Gilles. A few seconds later they finally showed him. As he was in the middle of the wooden area, I realized a car had just passed before him, just several seconds ahead but slower. Immediately I thought "****, hopefully it won't slow him down". Then I see Gilles clearly approaching full speed, turn left, then they show Mass ahead, he clearly has seen Gilles coming, he is moving left and I think "good, good place, on a straight, he is letting him pass". I wasn't even done thinking this that Mass to my total disbelief moved back to the center of the track. Next I see is a wheel touching and what appeared another car fly over him out of the screen. As it landed on the track, I realized it was Gilles and I knew he had died like that, in front of me, so unexpected. I still feel the pain today after 18 years, it's something you can't forget.

[BuzzingHornet]

Nightmare. I missed Imola 94, one of the only GPs i've missed in years and i'm glad. I've never seen the race. One day i might watch it but not for a long time

[mhferrari]

To quote Molive, "many posters are too young."

I am fifteen.

If someone is interested to give me anything related to Imola 94' for FREE, please contact me. My memory is sort of shaky. Because of stupid ESPN having taped coverage, I found out about the crash on CNN's affiliate Headline News for Sports at :50 something past the hour. The picture was an ambulance at the meagre run-off section off Tamberello.

[Mila]

this subject came up recently in the nostalgia forum.

according to Watkins, Senna appeared overly distraught after the Ratzenberger accident. it was at the racetrack medical center that Watkins suggested to the Brazilian that he not only skip the race, but also call it quits for good. my guess is that Watkins had the impression that Senna was not psychologically prepared to race. Senna replied something to the effect that there are things over which he had no control. read that as you may, but it doesn't necessarily mean that he was fatalistic.

things are a little fuzzy about the conversations with the girlfriend. Galisteu gave a Paris Match interview around the time of the funeral. here she insists that, over the phone, Senna had assured her that he was prepared to compete, and that he was strong enough to endure the events of the weekend. it's my understanding that the premonitions, fatalism, and so forth that Senna supposedly experienced--and reportedly related to her--were (at least in part) falsehoods perpetuated by the girlfriend's mother.

on the face of it, Senna may have reacted emotionally to the accidents, but it has to be said that there's a huge gap from "emotional" and "unstable." moreover, let's not disregard that the Brazilian's impetus to regenerate the GPDA was not only a practical reaction, but one that looked forward to the future.

[Monsell]

Since this is the after season period and this is a topic many people have given long thoughts, I will share my views and hope to have time to do some follow up.

I think Senna died because of plain bad luck, a very unfortunate incident but the accident was his fault.

The main problem with Senna was his obsession with winning. He had very serious problems admitting he could be defeated. Senna was a driver that risked more than others, that’s how he gained so many admirers, that’s how he could pull away at the start of a race. By risking more. His advantage rested in his believe that he couldn’t die in an accident. He was never involved in an accident which send him to the hospital nor had he seen another driver die. He built his immunity shield upon his religious faith, wonderful abilities and determination. That weekend at Imola, for the first time his shield was scratched. Although I don’t believe there was any premonition, it is clear that weekend’s incidents affected him. Gilles Villenueve, as Jacques, was aware of the extra risks he took when racing and was aware of the possibility of dying in an accident. Gilles took it as part of live, remember Gilles and Jacques, both, have said they don’t fear death. Senna on the other hand thought God would take care of him and that he wouldn’t die. This conviction and self believe is at the very root of his success and amazing maneuvers.

Senna was not feeling well that Sunday; he was not at peace with himself and didn’t want to race. Why did he race? To say because of his consummate professionalism is not enough. I think he couldn’t, because he was not a free man. He was obliged to live up to the image he created for himself. Just like in Australia ’89 (If I remember properly) when the conditions where really unacceptable and no championship was at stake, he couldn’t step out, and that is not professionalism... His and other drivers’ accidents driving totally blind by the rain showed their stupidity not professionalism. On May 1, 1994, Senna didn’t have the courage to step out.

Once the race was set, he was determined to win, as always. His mind was focused only on winning. But, why? Why did he have to win above all? Why did he have to risk so much? Trying to create a gap after the safety car pulled out he was the only driver running over the bumpy sector at Tamburello, the same he had advised Damon not to hit. (Please read a 1999 Autosport magazine article about the accident, unfortunately I don’t have it). Schumacher said that he saw Senna bottoming the previous lap and that Senna almost lost the car in a very scary way. Why is it so hard to accept that Senna could have made a mistake? He didn’t do a bad maneuver; his mistake was driving that fast over the bumpy sector which destabilized his car beyond his control. If there where still debris on the track and he picked some, why didn’t he take it easy for a few laps? Why did he have to lead every f*&*ing lap? (of course, people could say because he was Senna and that’s why he was the best). I recall nobody else was driving over the bumps like him. Frank and his team have always said that there was no mechanical failure. The Italian court couldn’t determine that something broke before the impact. Why is it so hard to believe that he went over the limit like in Silverstone ’89, Mexico or even Brazil ’94? All these are examples of him loosing it not because of a driver’s “maneuver error” but and error for driving above the package’s limits. He was calculating his risk and it was under control. Even the accident was an assumed risk, unfortunately this time fatality was there and God called him. It was an accident he should have walked out, like the above mentioned.

About the article, I believe that it lets us know more about Senna’s last days, but we should not read too much into it. It is easy to tie links in the aftermath, but as Bruce said, changing just one nanosecond of the accident, Senna would have walked out of his car and all this wouldn’t have become news. No premonition, just the normal uneasiness of a man who was forced to think about death and danger without having enough time to find total peace.

[Chris G.]

I'm glad for mh's post - this is something to be talked about.

I believe Senna was the greatest. I do not believe he was a savant or suicidal. If he knew he was going to die racing, he would have been committing suicide racing. He wasn't that stupid or fatalistic.

In the many videos and the onboard, there is nothing in Senna's crash that, to me, comes close to driver error. Something broke. Something broke. Something broke.

Senna was not himself that weekend, the pics and comments (especially to Prost) prove that. That doesn't mean he knew he was to die.

My point? Senna was in an F1 race. Something broke. He was killed freakishly by a suspension rod going through his helmit.

[BuzzingHornet]

I must admit, there is a strange moment right before the crash... you can see Senna's helmet in the wing mirror and suddenly it shifts around, like he was doing something or looking at something.

[senninha]

Onmly blind fan of Senna's rival can say the incident wasn't car's failure...

Piquet, Senna's hater, said: Tamburelo is a strait/corner, means, a corner can you easily make flat. There is almost impossible a driver mistake there.

and we're talking about Senna, not Rosset ...


BH,

"I personally think that Senna had never really faced up to the dangers until Ratzenberger, but it seemed that he was suddenly thinking of retirement"

Sorry, but this statement is a BS. Do you remeber when Martin Donnely had a big accident in Spain (90, I think) and Senna's reaction ?

[kenny]

great post RedFever... totally agree...
Hard to believe that a guy like Ayrton would make a mistake in tamburello...
He had been driving 11 years on that track... and numerous test sessions...

you could see he was distracted... but nobody knows what was exactly going on in his mind...
He was focused on winning the race --> Austrian flag...

anyway... Ayrton forever ;)

[doohanOK]

From Christopher Hilton's "Ayrton Senna: Hard Edge of Genius":

"Senna was told of Donnelly and he was close to tears. He walked to where Donnelly still lay and remained there a long time. He was not required to go; no protocol demanded that he go; but he went, and he stood, and he returned to the motorhome and asked everyone else to leave it. 'I wanted to be alone with my thoughts. They were private moments and I doubt that I will ever be able to express what I felt'.

Why did Senna go to where Donnelly lay? In part, because, I believe, his religious convictions took him there to face it, in part because he was now becoming a seigneur in Grand Prix racing, very possibly a potential spokesman for safety - as Lauda had been, as Prost was - and he felt he should have been there; in part because he cared very deeply about the consequences of human actions - which is another way of saying humanity again. Later that evening, he visited Donnelly in hospital and Donnelly recognized him and that was a moment, that was."

There was also some interesting words from Nigel Mansell in his autobiography when Ricardo Paletti was killed in Canada. I'll try find his words and quote them later.

regards,
doohanOK.

[Gudrun]

Originally posted by mhferrari
If I was Michael Schumacher and got my 42nd win. When I crossed the finish line, sort of like Senna would have done, I would have waved both the Brazilian flag and Austrian flag. Because that is what Ayrton would do on his 42nd win.


You could call it many things, I would call it closure.[p][Edited by mhferrari on 11-05-2000]

Well, MSch cried, because he did survive his 42 Grand Prix. It might have been the way for MSch to bring closure to the death of his Idol.....

[Witt]

Whilst i was touched by the article, i tend to agree with Bruce and Red that it's over-sensationalised. The writer has left out one important fact to make the article sound more dramatic, that of Elio De Angelis' death in 1986. Senna was de Angelis' team mate in 1985, so without a doubt would have been resonably shaken by his death. I have never read anything written about Senna's reaction to Elio's death, so if someone here's has something, it would be good to add to the thread.

The weekend was just so many bad co-incedences put together, nothing more. One of my friends recently found a tape on which he had accidently recorded the start of the race, knowing that i'm a F1 fan he passed it on to me. I thought i would be able to watch it, mostly out curiosity. I was not an F1 addict back in 94, i had seen the crash on computer video, but i'd never seen the crash in an "as it happened" way.

The tape cuts out just after the re-start, and i felt a sense of guilt for watching it. I knew the outcome and just felt so bad that i was, infact, watching a man die. It left me pretty depressed for a few days and i'm still annoyed at myself for falling to temptation and watching the tape.

I'm not saying that we should lock the video away from people who want to see it. People are curious and have a right to see it. I'm just warning people who have not seen the race that your view of racing changes forever once you see it in hindsight like i did.

Anyway, i prefer to remember senna the racer and watching him do his great stuff on the track - shed a tear of joy in awe of his ability instead of sadness surrounding his death.

[mhferrari]

I never saw the crash, or the race. Because of the Headline News thing, I never saw before or after the crash either. I just want to see it. I missed the last moments of a great man's racing career.

[pRy]

From my personal memorys of the weekend, id watched Ratzenberger suffer his crash live on Eurosport. It was a terrible accident and terrible post accident coverage, as the helicopter hovered over his car as they gave him CPR on a trolly, very disturbing pictures.
After the Rubens crash too.. that was the second big one.

Then when Ayrton left the road during the race, I was watching with my father, and I said out loud "What the hell is going on", just like that, Senna had hit the wall and it was immediatly obvious it was the third massive crash, and it just didnt seem real, it didnt seem part of F1, something "wrong" was happening. Senna was never one to have offs just like that, I think thats mainyl why I said it, just out of shock that Senna is leaving the road in such a way.

Murrays words I remember too as Senna came into camera shot flying off the road where : "What happened there!!!?!?!"

[mhferrari]

Pry,

Of course, Senna's steering wheel had fell. His steering column broke, which made it impossible to steer the wheel. Also, the telemetry indicated Senna drastically slowed the car. Obviously it was his steering wheel.

[RedFever]

Senninha, totally agree, and not only Nelson said it clearly (and Nelson was hardly Ayrton's fan...) but Jean Alesi said the same thing, I saw him on TV and you had to shoot him to make him change his mind. Jean said he had seen the images, but he didn't need too. An F1 driver does not lose the car there by human mistake. Period. Jean said, as far he is concerned, Tamburello was a stright, only if the car was broken you could hit that wall like Senna did. Similarly, Gilles Villeneuve in 1978 was accused of a stupid crash under the tunnel in Monaco. He was indignant at the accusation: "OK, listen, a driver makes mistakes, but on a straight???". To Gilles the tunnel turn in monaco was in an F1 a straight, just like Tamburello was in Imola (a week later his theroy was proven right, when Autosprint publish a series of pictures showing Gilles left rear tire suddenly lost pressure, sparks coming from under his car just 3 seconds before impact. In other words, as he knew all along, a driver crashes there only if he has a mechanical problem). F1 drivers like Senna or Villeneuve just don't go out on a part like that. Simple and clear.

I nver watch the images of Senna hitting the wall, I saw it once live and that's it. No need to see him die again. But I watched the images from his cockpit and Schumi's cockpit until 1 or 2 seconds from impact maybe one hundred times.

The images from Senna's cockpit are clearly telling us that Ayrton didn't kill himself as someone suggested in the press. He fought the crash until the last instant, trying to turn left a car that turned right AFTER the apex of the bend and reducing his speed from 185mph to 130mph with breakes (for sure - left skidmarks) and shifts (I am assuming this). However, these images are inconclusive because unfortunately do not show Ayrton's hands on the wheel, we only see the last moment reaction and his helmet move all the way to the rear left, as is pulling the damn thing.

The imges from Schumi's car, clearly show that Ayrton didn't lose his rear from going flat out on bumps or hitting some debris. Ayrton approached the turn very well and clean, even already passed the apex when all of a sudden the car simply changes direction and abrubptedly turns right. That must have surprised Ayrton and combined with the impossibility to react to a broken car, got Ayrton in the frenzy we see in the images from his car. But the change in direction happened at a point where the driver had already finished his manouvre, Ayrton had no responsibility in this crash. Something failed (in the front) that sent the car right into the wall. That's all there is. Of course, Williams has been extremely efficient in making the blck box on Ayrton's car disappear, the answer was right there, the fact the answer was destroyed only comfirms Ayrton didn't make any mistake.

[RedFever]

again, if it was the bottom, why would the Williams team first make the black box desappear and then erase it??? if nothing broke on his Williams, the team had nothing to fear and by turning in the black box they would have avoided a lenghty civil trial in Italy. No, they destroyed the evidence because it was shoing the car killed Ayrton. Very simple, really.

[mhferrari]

Pry,

I believe the plank was added to the cars after the incident (mid-season), I am not totally sure, but thats what it says under this website's safety timeline.

Michele Alboreto also mentioned that a crash at Tamberello could only occur due to car failure, at the trial.

Finally of course Williams knew what had happened and erased the black box data.

[mhferrari]

You said the plank, if there was a plank at Imola 1994, there would be something like sawdust, like saw at Spa. Yes, there were sparks, but I do not believe he lost it because of bottoming, if he did it would be obvious.

[Simioni]

There was evidence provided on trial that indicated that the car´s wheels were pointed towards the wall at one point before the crash, which obviously indicates a steering failure. As Redfever said, Senna went off when he was already exiting tamburello. It would take a half foot of irregular asphalt to throw the car straight like that.

[RedFever]

exactly, he was exiting, more than a bump Senna needed one of those planes the use for movies to get a car on two wheels to chenge direction like that....

Again, why Williams erased the black box is it showed Senna made a mistake and the car was not to blame?