The Life of Senna

by Rubython, Tom

  All the same, in the eyes of most people, Senna was still the clear title favourite. His biggest challengers were supposed to be his team-mate Hill, McLaren with its new Peugeot engine, and Ferrari. Not everyone took the testing pace of Schumacher’s Benetton seriously or believed the driver aid ban would shake up things so much as to wrong-foot the mighty Williams Renaults.

  But Senna, the man who had campaigned for a ban on electronic driver aids, was about to find himself wrong-footed. When he had been at McLaren, which didn’t have them, he had been a vigorous opponent. Now at Williams, he could see he had got it wrong. In fact Senna disliked the new breed of car from the start, and by the time he reached Brazil he was extremely worried. He ominously reported: “The cars are very fast and difficult to drive. It’s going to be a season with a lot of accidents and I’ll risk saying we’ll be lucky if something really serious doesn’t happen.”

  Schumacher had no idea how bad the Williams was or how good his car was, and he was also downbeat: “Hopefully we can push the Williams. Sometimes to stay close, sometimes to win a race, but, as for the championship, I think we are one more step away from that. They have the best package, but there will nevertheless be races where they don’t find the right set-up and we might find the right set-up and it will be very close. We will fight together and then, by strategies or stuff, we will win races. But too many bad things would need to happen to other teams for us to really have a chance to win the championship. Drivers like Senna or Hill, a team like Williams, they don’t make mistakes.”

  In the absence of the 1993 world champion, Alain Prost, Williams would be running numbers 0 and 2 on its cars as 1993 constructors’ champion. Against the tradition that the more experienced and illustrious driver took the lower number, Senna would race with number 2 while Damon Hill kept his 0 from the previous year. Senna refused to drive a car labelled zero.

  On 11th March he returned to Brazil to spend the two weeks before the Interlagos season-opener with Adriane. After that, he would leave for a whole season in Europe and not return to Brazil until it ended. It was the first time he had done that, and Adriane would arrive in Europe in late April May to spend the season with him.

  Once out in Brazil, alongside his press and business commitments, Senna was with family friends and Adriane. There was discord when photographs of Adriane were published in a magazine called Caras; Senna thought them unbecoming. But that was a storm in a teacup, reflecting the fact that he really cared for her and that something more serious was afoot in his life than even Formula One. The six-month trip to Europe was a trial run: if it didn’t work she would return to Brazil, and if it did they would probably be married.

  Senna was also nervous about his first big business venture. He had won the exclusive concession to import German Audi cars into Brazil, and had invited 2,000 guests to a launch on the Tuesday after the Grand Prix. There were hundreds of small details to attend to that week.

  On the Monday before the Brazilian Grand Prix he celebrated his 34th birthday with a group of friends. Among them was Gerd Kremer of Mercedes-Benz. He recalls: “The last time I saw him was in Brazil, at the Grand Prix. It was his birthday and he told me that he was worried. He was afraid something would happen to him. He was frightened for the young drivers and that there was nothing he could do if something went wrong with his car.”

  The Brazilian Grand Prix also brought its own pressures. Senna was Brazil’s absolute hero. Only footballer Pelé came close, and he was retired. The pressure on Senna at his home race was enormous. The fans demanded victory and to Senna even second place would be a pitiful reward for their support. An added pressure was that it was the first race of the season – a leap into the unknown for the teams and drivers, and not least Senna, with his growing concerns about the competence of his car.

  In the face of all this, Senna still wrestled the car onto pole, the 63rd of his career, with a best time of 1m 15.962secs, 0.328 seconds faster than Schumacher and 1.423 seconds quicker than the next nearest contender, Jean Alesi. Senna topped the timesheets in every practice and qualifying session of the weekend. But he knew what he had needed to do to achieve it. Driving 100 per cent all the time was dangerous, and he told his close friends so. The proof was Hill’s position on the grid – nowhere. Just like the latter years at McLaren, Senna found himself carrying the team. He had made an expensive change of team for nothing.

  The race was a different story. Senna made by far the best start, and pulled away into the distance as Schumacher got trapped behind Alesi’s Ferrari. Two laps later, Schumacher was through and began the seemingly impossible task of chasing down Senna. The cars pitted simultaneously on lap 21, with Senna still in front, but the Benetton pit crew were exceptionally quick and Schumacher regained the track in the lead. Once in the clear air he began to pull away and it was all Senna could do to keep him in view.

  After the second round of stops, Schumacher was still out front, but Senna had not given in. In six laps he had reduced the deficit from 9.2 seconds to just five seconds. He was not going to win but that didn’t stop him trying. Then his weakness – the reason he had scored 30 per cent more pole positions than race wins – prevailed. Instead of settling down for second, he pushed and pushed and pushed too much. As he rounded the third-gear Cotavelo corner on lap 56, he half-spun and stalled the engine in the middle of the track, for all the world a beginner’s error. As Senna unfastened his seatbelts, the crowd began to go home.

  Schumacher won. Senna offered no excuses for the spin. He said: “There was nothing wrong with the car. It was my fault. I was pushing too hard. For me it’s the most disappointing when I can’t give anything back to my fans here, who love me so much. It was obviously my mistake, but I needed to win. A second place in Brazil would have meant nothing to me.” Second would in fact have meant six points and less pressure. But his comments summed up the way he drove – a weakness that would simply increase the pressure until that fateful day at Imola.

  Damon Hill was no happier with the car, reporting: “I would describe it as virtually undriveable in the slow corners. And in the quick ones, it threatened to turf you off the track at any moment. It is unpredictable.”

  Even overlooking Senna’s mistake, however. Benetton had still run rings around Williams in the race, in clever pitwork and outright pace. It came as a surprise to many, who before the season began had believed the Williams-Senna combination was an undoubted super-team. Schumacher, assisted by rising engineer Ross Brawn and experienced designer Rory Byrne, was forging his own super-team.

  But even for those who rated Schumacher’s talent, the leap made by the Benetton chassis since 1993 seemed unthinkable. At this early stage in the season, the first accusations began that Benetton was running banned driver aids, including traction control. Senna heard the rumours and was disturbed by them.

  He stayed in Brazil for another week after the Grand Prix. The Audi concession launch went well. For a shy man Senna stepped confidently up to the microphone in front of his 2,000 guests and delivered a speech with the coolness of a professional speaker. It surprised his father Milton just how good he was. He was clearly enjoying his new challenge as a businessman. He was as natural at it as he was at driving. A few days later, he said his goodbyes to his family and Adriane and headed back to Europe for essential FW16 testing.

  Three hard days at Jerez were never going to solve all the problems, and a few days later Senna was on the long-haul flight to Japan for the Pacific Grand Prix at Aida, with the memory of Interlagos still fresh in his mind.

  On the Thursday of the Grand Prix, Senna was spotted chatting openly to Schumacher in the paddock. It was unusual as the pair had never been particularly friendly. When questioned about the meeting later, Schumacher revealed: “He wanted to congratulate me on my win in Brazil, as he had not seen me since and we said some nice things. That is all there was to it.” There was probably more to it, and some observers noted that Senna was probably trying to find out all he could about the
new opposition.

  One of the major news stories at Aida came from remarks in the Italian press by Nicola Larini – standing in for Jean Alesi, who had injured his neck – who implied Ferrari had some kind of traction-control system on its cars. Harsh punishments had been promised for any team found cheating that season, but after an investigation the FIA decided there was no need for sanctions. In reality, at that stage the FIA had little idea of how to police the new regulations. It was all new territory.

  In Japan, Senna was convinced that Benetton was using the banned traction control. He wrestled his car again to pole – the 64th of his career – although qualifying did not pass without incident. His time came from the Friday session and luckily for him the Saturday times were slower in the higher temperatures because he spun during his first run, a move mirrored by Damon Hill. A frustrated Senna said: “I really don’t know what happened. It’s odd that it happened the same for both of us. But I really don’t understand because the car had one of the best positions at that point of the corner throughout the weekend. It was disappointing and frustrating because it looks silly and stupid. I feel very unhappy about it… with myself. But it was better it happened today and not tomorrow.”

  Senna did not like being made to look stupid, especially when there seemed to be no real reason for it. It was reminiscent of his Formula Three career when he had been struggling against Martin Brundle, unable to understand why the Englishman was suddenly quicker than he was and not knowing that Brundle had received engine improvements he had not had himself. He had crashed on several occasions in the second half of the season then. Dick Bennetts, his Formula Three team boss, said: “If we’d had the same engine rebuild six or seven races before we wouldn’t have had half the accidents that we did.”

  Amazingly Senna was hopeful for the race. But it was misplaced. He didn’t make it past the first corner, having starting sluggishly, and Schumacher flew past him into the lead. The German braked earlier for the first corner than Senna expected: when Senna braked, the fast-starting Mika Häkkinen ran into the back of him, punting Senna into a spin that resulted in him being t-boned by Larini’s Ferrari.

  Senna was furious with Häkkinen, his former team-mate. “It was very irresponsible driving and shouldn’t be allowed,” he burst out. After his accident he spent several laps standing at the side of the track watching Schumacher and the other cars pass. Some thought he was listening for traction control. Schumacher won the race, and with it had claimed a maximum 20 points to Senna’s none.

  Before the season had begun, people were predicting that the best Schumacher could hope for after two races would be an eight-point deficit to Senna. Claims that in 1994 Senna could score 10 or 11 wins and beat Prost’s all-time record were beginning to look shaky. Some less kind commentators suggested that Senna had cracked. But he could not comment on how bad the car was publicly out of deference to Williams and Renault. Once again the pundits had got it wrong, but it all piled on extra pressure for Imola.

  After watching the Benetton for lap after lap Senna was sure it had traction control. He had also been surprised how quickly the car had come off the line, and believed it was using the banned launch control as well.

  Peter Collins, the Lotus team principal, went to see Frank Williams after the race. While he was waiting, he bumped into Senna. Collins remembers it well: “I said to Ayrton that the Benetton was behaving like a car that had traction control. Ayrton, suddenly animated that I had reflected exactly what he was thinking, said to me: ‘I am sure they are. I have followed it a number of times and I am sure they are’.”

  Senna told Collins he was determined to beat him whatever. Collins says: “He saw himself as being on a crusade of integrity and honour.” The conversation ended as Collins went off to converse with Frank Williams: he was convinced that Senna was resolved to do something about it.

  Senna arrived back in England on the Tuesday after the race and attended the post-race briefing at the Didcot factory. Williams staffers were surprised. On the following day he flew to Paris where he kicked off a football friendly between Brazil and Paris St Germain. From there he returned to his home at Quinta do Largo in Portugal before he was due at the French track of Nogaro on Monday 25th April, for a quick shakedown test of the reportedly improved FW16. He went from there to Munich, where on Tuesday he had meetings concerning his Audi car importing business in Brazil. On Wednesday 27th April, his pilot Captain O’Mahoney was waiting in Munich to fly him back home and then on to Bologna for his date with destiny at the San Marino Grand Prix.

  CHAPTER 30

  Death: 2:18pm

  Sunday 1st May 1994

  The final accounting

  The first time 200 million TV viewers realised that Ayrton Senna had failed to complete lap seven of the San Marino Grand Prix was when Michael Schumacher’s Benetton Ford swept into their screens at the exit of Tamburello. They could just see a cloud of dust in the background, as his Williams Renault rebounded off the Tamburello concrete wall and came to rest in the middle of the run-off area.

  Murray Walker was commentating on British television: “Well, we are right with Michael Schumacher now, and Senna, my goodness, I just saw it punch off to the right, what on earth happened there I don’t know.” Walker’s shock and surprise was down to Senna being out of his third race in succession with no points on the board. He had no reason to worry about Senna’s safety; he had seen many, many accidents worse than this.

  But one man felt immediate concern. Brazilian commentator Galvao Bueno, in the TV Globo cabin, had Senna’s friend Antonio Braga by his side. He was the first to realise the accident was probably fatal. He and Braga simply looked at each other. They knew it was very bad. Bueno was more knowledgeable than most TV journalists, simply because he was one of Senna’s best friends and had total access. Reginaldo Leme was also in the commentary box with them.

  Bueno made no attempt to play down the situation. He said to millions of Brazilians: “Ayrton has hit [the wall] badly. It’s serious, it’s very serious.” Bueno quickly worked out Senna’s crash speed. He told Braga: “You know, when you hit a wall at 130mph, already the deceleration is lethal.” In truth, drivers should never survive accidents of this nature, but in reality they do most of the time and, not only that, walk away uninjured. But this was not one of those times.

  Murray Walker is no less knowledgeable but not in Bueno’s technical way. The BBC was showing continuous re-runs to avoid events on the ground.

  But before the marshals could get to Senna and the first medical car had reached the scene, his head moved forward in the cockpit and unknowing viewers were encouraged that the champion was intact. Another man, sitting thousands of miles away in Balcarce, Argentina, knew different. Five-time, world champion, 82-year-old Juan Manuel Fangio knew the outcome when he saw the spasm, the sign of a massive head injury. He switched off his television. He said later: “I knew he was dead.”

  It soon became apparent that in describing the split-second before the car hit the wall, Bueno had been spot on. Senna had managed to slow the car by 60 mph before it hit the wall, and the impact speed was estimated at 130 mph. The right-hand front of the car took the full brunt of the impact: a wheel flew off and was trapped between the chassis and the wall, as the suspension crumpled and the Williams catapulted back onto the track. The monocoque was split by the force of the impact, but otherwise intact.

  Marshals were quickly on the scene, but were frozen in their tracks by what they saw.

  As a helicopter with an overhead camera was soon hovering, pictures of the car were being transmitted live to an avid audience. BBC television and Murray Walker sensitively switched to its pitlane camera, but other broadcasters did not and stayed glued to the scene. It was starting to become very unpleasant.

  Senna’s girlfriend Adriane Galisteu was at Senna’s home in Portugal, watching the race on television. When his car hit the wall, she remembers a selfish thought went through her mind: “Oh that’s good! He’ll be
home sooner.” She waited for him to throw off his gloves, undo the steering wheel and leap from the cockpit. It didn’t occur to her for a second that he wouldn’t. Even in the 18 months she had known him, this had happened a few times, always with the same outcome.

  Captain O’Mahoney, who had moved Senna’s plane to Bologna for a quick departure, was also watching the race on television in the executive jet centre. He got ready to leave early when he saw the crash. But when his boss didn’t get out of his car he quickly sat down again.

  Josef Leberer was in the Williams garage. He remembered: “I said c’mon, c’mon, move, move, get out of the car, boy.” Suddenly a heavy feeling enveloped Leberer, who knew something was very wrong.

  The Portuguese TV commentators gave Adriane no cause for concern and there was nothing that suggested to her that the accident was anything out of the ordinary, certainly no more serious than other crashes he had survived. She remembered: “I jumped up from the sofa, holding the plate on which I was having my lunch.” But that soon changed. She grew more anxious as he stayed in the car. She shouted out to Senna’s Portuguese housekeeper, Juraci: “What are they waiting for?” She said: “He must have broken his arms or a leg.” She screamed at the TV: “Get out of the car, get out!” After a few minutes when he had not moved, she recalled: “I was motionless and I started to sob.”

  As Professor Sid Watkins approached Tamburello in his medical car, he somehow knew it was Senna who had crashed. Watkins found him slumped in the Williams. The doctor from the first intervention car was already with him and cradling his head, aware from the condition of his helmet and seeping blood that he had suffered a massive head injury. The two men looked at each other, unsure of what they would see when they got the helmet off. Watkins frantically cut the chin strap and lifted the helmet off gently, whilst others supported his neck. Blood poured out. His forehead was a mess and, more worryingly, blood and brain matter was seeping from his nose.