The Life of Senna

by Rubython, Tom

  Brundle impressed Tyrrell too that day, taking its normally aspirated 012 round faster than it had ever gone before: his best time of 1m 13.2secs would have been good enough for 12th on that year’s Grand Prix grid.

  Bernie Ecclestone arranged for Senna to test a Brabham at Paul Ricard; Brabham had won the drivers’ championship with Nelson Piquet at the helm and Ecclestone was keen to find a young charger to motivate the Brazilian. But it was by no means certain that he would sign for Brabham: as he headed for Paul Ricard in the south of France to test the Brabham BMW, there was still a chance Bernie Ecclestone would offer all he wanted. But that dream was shattered when Nelson Piquet went out and set a 1m 5.9secs in the Brabham BT52B. Senna, testing with Mauro Baldi, Pierluigi Martini and Colombian Roberto Guerrero, was two seconds slower. It seemed obvious that Piquet had manipulated the situation with his mechanics.

  Piquet also decided he didn’t want Senna in the team. “I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t,” Senna later admitted. In reality he knew he had blown it with Brabham: as expected, Piquet blocked Senna and Ecclestone had little choice but to listen to his established driver. It was a rare mistake. But Senna wanted to race in Formula One in 1984 so he took what he could.

  He had cannily kept Toleman on ice, and when Italian Teo Fabi signed for Brabham Senna signed a deal with the Toleman team. He said afterwards: “I promised myself I would not go home until I was absolutely sure I had a Formula One ride or had exhausted every opportunity.”

  Senna read the Toleman contract over the phone to his Brazilian lawyer. Typically, Senna had objected every so often to the best English legalese that Hawkridge’s lawyers had drafted. Hawkridge, who appreciated the irony of a Portuguese-speaking Brazilian taking on the Establishment over English syntax, found himself agreeing with his new driver. Every ‘i’ had to be dotted and every ‘t’ crossed before Senna was satisfied.

  “We went afterwards for a drink in a pub down the road from our headquarters in Brentwood,” Hawkridge remembers, “and suddenly Ayrton became a different character. It was as if he switched off from business mode and became this different man. There was no outward sign in his bearing or his manner, but it was as if he just decided that he was done for the day and could start relaxing. He began telling jokes, that was how we knew this steely businessman had taken the rest of the day off.”

  Senna signed a long-term deal that he had little intention of sticking to. He knew he would get a drive with a top team for 1985; he just didn’t know which one. To ensure he would be free there was a clause in the contract that he could buy himself out for £100,000. “I will promise you 100 per cent effort every time I get into the cockpit,” he told Hawkridge, “but if I decide that the car is not competitive I will go to another team. And if you try to stop me leaving, I will retire.” Retirement was a typically empty Senna threat.

  He said: “I knew that the impression I made in my first season in Formula One would be vital. And I did not want to be overcome in any political battles by a senior driver within the team. It was important to me that I went somewhere that I had a degree of control over my destiny, and also where I would be given the space to grow at my own pace.” As usual, everything was calculated to the nth degree.

  Toleman began the year with the same TG183B that Warwick and Bruno Giacomelli had driven the previous season. Warwick’s best results had been two miserable fourth places. The car was reasonable, but its Pirelli tyres were no match for the rival Goodyear and Michelin rubber, and Toleman was being exceedingly brave in developing its own Brian Hart 1.5-litre turbo engine in the face of well-funded engines from Ferrari, BMW, Honda and TAG-Porsche. A new car was on the way.

  Senna’s debut, fittingly, was in Rio de Janeiro in March. Watched by family, friends and expectant fellow countrymen, he acquitted himself and qualified 16th. He was just ahead of new team-mate Johnny Cecotto on the grid, but tellingly he was more than a second faster. In the race he lasted eight laps before the boost pressure plunged, but next time out in South Africa, where he was again over a second faster than Cecotto in qualifying, he lined up 13th. He fought off heat exhaustion after losing the Toleman’s wide nose early in the race, then he ran over debris on the straight while checking his gauges to pinpoint why his turbo boost pressure was fluctuating. This upset the aerodynamics and made the steering extremely heavy, and though he soldiered on to bring the car home sixth and score his first point, he collapsed after the race.

  After the race Senna went along to the medical centre, where he met Professor Sid Watkins, the FIA’s medical director, for the first time. He marched into the centre and, as Watkins recalls, started acting the prima donna. Senna said he was suffering cramp in his neck and shoulders and that it was causing him severe pain. Watkins remembered: “He did not understand the nature of his problem, and was creating a fuss until I told him in a few short, sharp words that his condition was not mortal, it was simply a problem of physical chemistry. The rational look returned to his eyes and thereafter, he behaved impeccably. He was at heart a gentleman.”

  In Belgium Senna was uncharacteristically slow, qualifying only 19th, half a second behind Cecotto, but finished seventh after struggling with the TG183B’s uncompetitive Pirelli tyres. The malaise carried on to Imola where the unthinkable happened: for the only time in his life Ayrton Senna failed to qualify for a race.

  But the circumstances were difficult. Toleman was dissatisfied with Pirelli’s performance and was looking for a way to break the contract and sign for Michelin. The team alleged that money was owed by Pirelli, and a financial argument erupted between the two at the race; Senna was caught in the middle. He was instructed not to run on the Friday, which was a handicap on a tricky circuit that he did not know, and then when he did get going on Saturday his Hart 415T engine developed a misfire. It was a disaster, especially as Cecotto qualified only 19th, but it was only a momentary setback.

  The storm cloud had a silver lining. Next time out, at the Dijon circuit in France, the new Toleman TG184s appeared, shod with Michelin tyres. Senna qualified 13th, well clear of Cecotto, but retired with turbo failure. Then came Monaco.

  This was only Ayrton Senna’s sixth Grand Prix, and everyone who saw it still believes that the extraordinary decision by clerk of the course Jacky Ickx, himself one of the greatest rain-masters of all time, to stop it prematurely because of the monsoon conditions cost the Brazilian his first victory.

  The race began in poor conditions. Alain Prost led, before being overtaken by Nigel Mansell. When the Briton crashed dramatically, Prost took over again. But Senna was sensational. From 13th on the starting grid he picked his way steadily past vastly more experienced drivers who could not match his pace on the streaming roads of the principality. Ninth on the opening lap, he soon disposed of Lafitte’s Williams and Manfred Winkelhock’s ATS. From the seventh lap, nobody was watching anyone else. On the 10th lap Senna clobbered the kerb at the chicane, but undaunted he swept by Keke Rosberg’s misfiring Williams two laps later. Then Michele Alboreto spun his Ferrari, gifting him another place. Soon he caught René Arnoux’s Ferrari, then Lauda’s McLaren. After 19 laps only Prost lay ahead. Lap by lap he closed on the Frenchman, who at the time was the yardstick of the sport. It took nothing away from Senna’s drive that Stefan Bellof in the Goodyear-shod Tyrrell was gradually hauling him in. Bedraggled spectators and hardy Formula One hands alike watched spellbound as the chunky white car moved closer and closer to its red-and-white target. The worse the conditions became, the faster Senna and Bellof went. It was only a matter of time for Prost, who was in trouble with his brakes and said later that he had been prepared to concede to Senna in the interests of scoring championship points. By the 31st lap Prost was signalling for the race to be stopped, but Senna kept walking on the water, his best lap 1.2 seconds faster than the McLaren driver’s. Just before they crossed the line for the 32nd lap the Toleman edged dramatically ahead, but clerk of the course Ickx had instructed the red flag to be deployed. Round that slowdown lap,
Senna waved triumphantly to the appreciative crowd, convinced that he had won his first Grand Prix. But to his intense chagrin he was reminded on his return to the pits that the rules backdated the result one lap from the time the red flag came out. Prost had won after all.

  Incensed, Senna screamed in disappointment at officials. Unofficial accusations began to sweep the paddock that they had favoured a French driver, but nothing could be done. The race was over and Prost had won. Senna just had to accept it.

  Circumstances never allowed him to get close to a repeat performance that year. He finished seventh in Canada after qualifying an excellent ninth a long way ahead of Cecotto, but crashed in Detroit after qualifying a sensational seventh. In Dallas he was sixth on the grid but retired with driveshaft failure. Elsewhere his luck was also out. At Hockenheim he was lucky to escape unharmed from a crash resulting from rear-wing failure, having qualified ninth; at the Österreichring he started 10th but lost oil pressure; and at Zandvoort he was 13th on the grid but retired with engine failure after 19 laps.

  But in between these problems came his second podium, when he turned seventh place on the grid for the British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch into third place, also setting the third-fastest race lap. Cecotto never got a look-in against him, and after the Venezuelan’s Formula One career ended with a leg-breaking shunt at Brands Hatch, Toleman ran just one car for Senna until Monza.

  Engine-builder Brian Hart still raves about his time working with Senna that season. “The guy just had it all. He was so special. I never worked with anyone like him. It wasn’t just that he could come into the pits and tell you what revs he’d been pulling in any gear at any given part of any lap; it wasn’t just that his feedback was so clear and precise; he really loved what he was doing. It was everything to him, and he gave it everything he had.”

  But storm clouds were beginning to gather over the relationship. It was possibly all part of Senna’s game plan, and he executed it to a tee. At Dallas he argued bitterly with Hawkridge. A sportscar race had left the track breaking up in places, and the team decreed that there was no point in running in Saturday’s practice. Senna disagreed, and went ahead regardless.

  It was probably a coincidence that he was in negotiations with Peter Warr of Lotus for 1985. Warr was intent on replacing Mansell. He had had enough of the darling of the late Colin Chapman, who would head off to replace Laffite at Williams. Michelin had also indicated that it was going to pull out of Formula One at the end of the season, and Senna saw little chance of Toleman getting Goodyear tyres. That meant patching things up with Pirelli. Toleman was beginning to look less attractive after all for a second season.

  By the time of the Dutch Grand Prix on 26th August, Senna had agreed to join Lotus and drive a Lotus Renault, which he thought would be a better car than the Williams Honda in 1985.

  He would partner Elio de Angelis, the well-bred Italian. Senna knew from watching him on the track that he was no slouch. He was fast and smooth, and under-rated. But Senna also knew that in a political fight, the Roman gentleman was merely a tyro. Lotus was a team that he could bend and mould to his own will. But there is no doubt that Senna joined Lotus on the basis of being number two. At least that’s what he said: “I don’t want to be number one, I’m happy to drive with Elio and learn my trade – you know, make some progress.”

  Warr didn’t think this state of affairs would last for long, as he regarded Senna as the most complete driver to appear on the scene since Jimmy Clark.

  The contract with Toleman, which was due to run to the end of 1986, would be terminated when Senna invoked the £100,000 buy-out clause as he had always planned to do.

  But long before an announcement, rumours circulated and everyone in the paddock knew that Senna would go to Lotus – in his heart of hearts Hawkridge knew it too. However, Senna slightly miscalculated his timing, and was in breach when the Lotus deal was announced because he hadn’t actually invoked the buy-out clause. It was his mistake. Hawkridge was incensed that Team Lotus had issued a press release at Zandvoort saying that of course Senna would complete the season with Toleman.

  In revenge, Hawkridge suspended Senna from the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, replacing him with Stefan Johansson. Hawkridge knew the Brazilian would be upset and he was. He went ballistic but Hawkridge was unmoved. If Senna wanted to point to clauses in his contract, then so could he. “Of course he was absolutely, totally right to want to leave us,” says Hawkridge. “And I can say that now that time and events have healed some of the rift. He was ruthless in identifying what he wanted and going about getting it, even if it meant going against a contract. That was no barrier to his progress.”

  Hawkridge acknowledges that there was a degree of vindictiveness in the decision to suspend the young driver: “I wanted to teach him a lesson. I knew that stopping him from racing was what would hurt him most, but I wanted him to leave us knowing that there is a price to pay for everything you do in life. It shook him rigid.”

  A subdued Senna issued a press statement in Monza, denying Toleman’s allegations and defending his actions. He said that he had told Hawkridge of his intentions immediately after the Austrian Grand Prix on 19th August, and that he intended to exercise his buy-out clause. In Italy he added: “I intended to keep quiet about the whole thing and deal with the people who were involved at Toleman. I don’t want any more aggravation.”

  It later emerged that Senna’s manager Armando Botelho Texheriro had been in secret contact with Lotus since early July, and the negotiations had been underway for two months. Denis Jenkinson, the top F1 journalist of the time, writing in Motor Sport magazine, described Senna’s tactics as: “A simple case of bad manners and lack of discipline.” Senna simply claimed that he had been indicating since early in the season that he would be moving elsewhere.

  Johansson did well, bringing Senna’s Toleman home fourth.

  Senna returned for Toleman at the Nürburgring and made a point by qualifying 12th (a long way ahead of Johansson, who had mechanical problems) but was eliminated in a first-corner shunt. His relationship with the team ended in Portugal, where he set fastest time on Saturday morning and qualified a sensational third, only a couple of 10ths shy of Piquet and Prost and a second faster than his Swedish team-mate. He drove a hard and very competitive race to third; but on the podium, as runner-up Lauda celebrated his half-point world championship victory over race-winner Prost, Senna’s expression was initially one of complete disdain, as if he took no joy from either man’s success, or even his own. This was, after all, the man who once said: “I am not designed to finish second, I am designed to win.”

  So Ayrton Senna moved on, and Toleman slid into a crevasse. In later years Senna would be ambiguous about the real reasons why he left, suggesting that it wasn’t lack of faith in the team’s technical ability after all. He claimed he would have been happy to stay. Perhaps the simple truth was that he really had foreseen the problems that lay ahead for the team as Michelin withdrew. Pirelli was still angry after the argument at Imola, while Goodyear told Toleman time and again there could be no rubber deal for 1985.

  Toleman’s subsequent tyre-supply misfortunes paved the way for the sale at the end of the 1985 season to its new sponsor, the Benetton family. From 1986 until the end of 2001, the team would race under the Benetton name.

  By then Ayrton Senna was long gone. Breaking his contract might not have been fair or moral, and he had handled it badly. There had indeed been a buy-out clause, but the terms required Senna to inform Toleman of his intention to exercise it before entering into any detailed discussions with other teams. His failure to do so was what really caused the friction with Hawkridge.

  However, it had been the right thing to do for his career. Hawkridge knew that too, and concedes the point. “You know,” he says, harking wistfully back to bygone days and the most magical year of Toleman’s brief life, “we never had a better driver in one of our cars.”

  At the very end of the year, Senna had a health scare
when he developed Bell’s palsy, an affliction of the nerve of the facial muscles, probably due to a virus. One side of his face became totally paralysed: he was unable to close his eye and his mouth was drawn to one side. He went to see Sid Watkins at the London Hospital: the professor put him on steroids to try to protect the swelling in the nerve, to preserve the possibility of recovery.

  CHAPTER 9

  Race of the Champions

  The day Senna scalped the greats

  As long as drivers have raced in Formula One, there has been speculation as to how the greatest drivers would have compared had they been competing in the same equipment and the same era. Rarely is there a chance to discover the truth. But in May 1984, for the inaugural race at the new Nürburgring track, the world got the opportunity to see 11 past, present and future world champions, plus a further handful of Formula One winners and sportscar aces battle it out in identical Mercedes 190E saloon cars. And it was Ayrton Senna, a Formula One rookie in his first season, who emerged the winner.

  Technically, Senna shouldn’t even have been allowed to compete: the event was for the cream of motorsport history, and at the time the biggest accolade that Senna had to his name was that he was reigning British Formula Three champion. Many of his rivals had never even heard of him. But he had impressed some of the right people and he was granted the right to take part. It was the biggest chance yet to show his genius.

  The 14-mile-long Nürburgring had last been used as a Formula One track in 1976, when Niki Lauda’s fiery accident had seen it scrapped from the calendar and the German Grand Prix moved to Hockenheim. Though minus a Formula One licence, some racing did continue at the track, but in May 1982 work began on a new, much shorter and safer circuit, retaining only the start-finish straight of its notorious predecessor. The new track was completed in spring 1984, and it was decided that the best way to open it would be to gather some of motor racing’s biggest stars for a race.