The Life of Senna

by Rubython, Tom

  In August 1988 Senna was saddened when it was announced Enzo Ferrari had died just before the Hungarian Grand Prix. The Italian Grand Prix was the only event the man known as ‘Il Commendatore’ ever attended – and then only on the Friday, for qualifying. Senna hardly knew the Ferrari doyen but had hoped to drive for the team before he died. Nigel Mansell was the last driver to be signed personally by Il Commendatore. As a result, the Italian event at Monza was a sombre occasion. It was the first race in Italy since Enzo Ferrari’s death, and the Ferrari team was particularly fired up to do well for the departed patriarch.

  Despite that, Senna and Prost took their customary places on the front row; the Ferraris of Berger and Alboreto lined up behind them. It was a record 10th pole of the season for Senna, who had beaten Jim Clark’s long-standing best of nine. In the middle of the race Prost’s Honda failed, but with two laps remaining Senna was still in the lead, pursued by Berger, after leading every lap. It was then that the miracle happened.

  Nigel Mansell had caught chickenpox and had been replaced at Williams by Martin Brundle and then 39-year-old French near-rookie Jean-Louis Schlesser. When Senna came up to lap the Frenchman for the second time in the race, Schlesser did not notice him and stuck to his line. Senna went for the gap anyway and collided with the Williams. The second McLaren was out, Berger and Alboreto were handed an astonishing one-two and the crowd was delirious.

  Schlesser explained afterwards: “I didn’t want to block Ayrton, but then at the last possible moment I had to turn. When I went he was on the kerb inside and then he hit my wing. I feel very sorry for him, but I don’t think it was my fault. However, I am going to see him and say sorry.”

  Berger was delighted to take Ferrari’s first home victory since title-winner Jody Scheckter in 1979: “It is the greatest win of my career and I’d like to give it to the old man, to Ferrari. Seeing all those people on the track cheering for me and the team was fantastic. It is one of the best days of my life.”

  McLaren’s loss was ironic after all the testing it had done at Monza.

  Two weeks later, in Estoril, Prost won and Senna could only finish sixth. It seemed as if he was beginning to crack and for the first time things had got nasty. Prost had taken pole, but Senna got the better start. As Prost pulled out of his slipstream at the end of lap one, the cars were side by side at 190mph with Prost between Senna and the pitwall. Senna seemingly nudged him towards the wall as the pit crews swiftly pulled in their boards. It was that close. Exhibiting some incredible car control, Prost skimmed towards the concrete but still managed to take the lead. The Frenchman said afterwards: “It was dangerous. If he wants the world championship that badly, he can have it. I said I had lost the title in Belgium and I still think that way. But if my car is as perfect as it was today then I have a chance in the next three races. Who knows what can happen.”

  The Portuguese race marked the start of the enmity that was inevitable once the championship was at stake. Prost was right on that occasion: Senna should have given him the room, but he didn’t.

  At Jerez Prost won again, while Senna struggled to fourth from pole with a fuel indicator problem. The title was too close to call. Prost was ahead on total points – 84 to 79 – but only the best 11 scores counted. Prost had been the more consistent McLaren driver and as a result his win at Jerez counted for only three points instead of nine, because he had already taken five firsts and six seconds. It meant that Senna needed only to win in Suzuka to put the championship beyond Prost’s reach. The situation was unprecedented as the teams headed for Japan.

  With the championship so close between two drivers in the same team, things took a comic turn as Jean-Marie Balestre, president of governing body FISA, got involved. He wrote a letter to Honda’s president, Tadashi Kume, telling him how important it was to make sure that both drivers had equal equipment for the final two races of the year. The strong implication of Balestre’s letter was that Honda had been favouring Senna and giving Prost inferior specification engines in 1988, which was why Senna had proved the faster driver. It was a partisan move, Balestre and Prost both being French, and highly provocative.

  It was designed to spook Senna and upset Honda. It worked and Honda was furious. But Balestre, for all his bumbling, had hit a nerve. It was something a lot of people had been thinking, if not openly talking about. Senna had blasted Prost away so comprehensively in qualifying all season that it seemed obvious to a French eye what was going on. Only at the French Grand Prix at Paul Ricard had Prost seemed on equal terms, and then he blasted Senna away. The implication of that was obvious as well. The publicity advantage of Prost winning his home race for Honda in France was far higher than Senna winning.

  As well as his letter, Balestre was also privately briefing journalists – including Brazilians – about the situation.

  It certainly irked Tadashi Kume, who was moved to respond to Jean-Marie Balestre in an open letter. It was pinned up on the press room noticeboard at Suzuka. The letter reassured Formula One fans that Honda would supply equal equipment for the last two races of the season and not favour one driver. It also reiterated that Honda had been supplying equal equipment for the whole year. Kume’s letter vented its anger on Balestre in the most condescending way possible. The last paragraph read: “Finally I would like to express my sincere gratitude to you for consistently performing your important role as president of FISA.” The deep irony of that comment was completely lost on Balestre.

  Everyone sensed Senna would be champion at Suzuka. His old Formula Ford 2000 entrants Dennis Rushen and Robin Green decided to make the trip to be there when it happened.

  It set the scene for the world championship showdown. As expected, Senna took pole. But it turned out to be to his disadvantage, as it was situated on the dirty side of the track. Qualifying was interesting as it was interspersed with damp conditions. Prost had continuing niggling problems with his car and the outcome was no surprise.

  Senna later told his first biographer, Christopher Hilton, how he felt at the beginning of a race: “You must think of everything in the enormous turmoil at the start of a race. It is a totally unreal moment, it is like a dream, like entering another world.”

  The pressure got to Senna and at the start he stalled as the other cars rushed past his stranded McLaren. His hands shot up from the cockpit warning the cars behind him. He knew he could get the car going and was desperate not to be hit from behind, which he knew would end his chances. He dipped the clutch and the car started rolling forward. In the days before sophisticated electronic transmission, drivers changed gears just like in a road car and he managed to get the car going on the slightly downhill track, but by that time he was back in 14th place and Prost was pulling away into the distance. The rest was pure driving mastery, as he clawed his way back to the head of the field.

  By the end of the first lap he was in eighth. In three successive laps on a damp track he passed Alessandro Nannini, Thierry Boutsen and Michele Alboreto. On lap 10 he took Gerhard Berger, and on lap 19 Ivan Capelli’s Adrian Newey-designed March Judd suffered electrical failure while battling for the lead: Senna was in second. Luckily for him Prost was having his own gearbox problems, probably similar to what had caused Senna to stall on the grid. On lap 27 he passed Prost for the lead but drama was still to come. In the latter stages of the race it began to rain again and he pointed to the sky each time he passed the pits, trying to have the race stopped by officials, just as Prost had done when he had been catching the Frenchman at Monaco in 1984.

  On the last corner he raised his fist and as he crossed the line both fists went in the air. Hundreds of Brazilian flags waved in the grandstand as Senna banged his fists on the steering wheel all the way round his parade lap. He was crying in his helmet in this only private moment before he faced the press and the congratulations.

  He had won his first world championship at the age of 28. As he crossed the line he looked upwards, thanking God. Later he told journalists that he had seen God at
the moment he became champion.

  As the new world champion watched replays of his move on Prost, after the race, he had tears in his eyes. “I still can’t believe it’s all over,” he said. “I love to win. That is why I joined McLaren and Honda. I wanted to be in a winning car. The fact that Alain Prost was in the team made no difference to me.” Some people scoffed when he claimed he had seen God as he crossed the finish line, but for Senna it had been a moving experience. It was clear in the press room later that most of the journalists had been rooting for Prost and were disappointed to see Senna win.

  Afterwards Senna made time for the friends who had got him there: Robin Green and Dennis Rushen, Keith Sutton and Reginaldo Leme of TV Globo. His friends got the best interviews and the best pictures.

  The Suzuka result made the season finale in Adelaide, Australia academic: Prost took victory with Senna second. But the irony of the season’s rankings was not lost on him or Prost: under today’s points scoring system, Prost would have triumphed by 10 points. But that was then. In 1988 the governing body was playing by Senna’s rules and he didn’t care how he had won. He had won. Senna finished the championship three points ahead of his rival. McLaren finished the constructors’ championship on 199 points. Its nearest rival Ferrari only scored 65. That was the scale of the domination.

  Years later, Senna said the McLaren Honda MP4/4 was by far the best car he ever drove in his career: “To be successful, you must have everything. And apart from all the organisational structure, a good engine and a good car, that is what McLaren gave me. The best car I drove in my career, by far, was in 1988. That McLaren was a fantastic car, with a beautiful Honda V6 turbo engine.” It was a year when McLaren Honda rewrote the record books in the world of Formula One racing with an unprecedented 15 victories out of 16 races. It was also the last season for turbocharged engines.

  Senna handed a lot of the credit to Ron Dennis for his championship win. He said: “Ron Dennis is a super person to organise a racing team, because he has a wide span of knowledge, he knows the drivers and the engineers, and he has very good organising power.”

  Almost immediately Senna returned to Brazil to celebrate his championship with his own people. He was also keen to reacquaint himself with Xuxa Meneghel. He knew that now he was champion, everything would be different in his life.

  CHAPTER 14

  1989: Losing the Battle

  Winning Xuxa but not the Championship

  The relationship started in earnest with Xuxa Meneghel on the first day of 1989, deep in the Brazilian summer. They had arranged their schedules to spend time together – Senna would get home to São Paulo as often as possible – but it was always going to be difficult. However they resolved at the beginning in January to spend a whole year together come what may, and they did. But the careers kept clashing and they both knew it was not to be, although it took a long time to really dawn on them.

  To facilitate the relationship and to give him a private place, he bought a beach house in the Brazilian resort of Angra. Prior to Angra he had never really had a home of his own in Brazil, relying on his parents. At 29 it was finally time for him to leave the nest.

  His long spell with his parents had had other beneficial effects. His essentially quiet and reserved nature, together with his keen intelligence and conservative upbringing, meant that he was never tempted by the sex, drugs and rock and roll excesses of many Brazilian celebrities who couldn’t handle sudden fame.

  He was immensely grateful to his parents and never tired of saying so. Right up to his death, he still called them Mummy and Daddy when speaking to them in English: “I think I am very fortunate because my father and mother gave me the fundamental feelings that I have until today. Together with that I have a wonderful sister, a special brother, and we always live very close to each other, always thinking as a group, as a whole, always being positive about things. We always had a healthy life, we always had everything we wanted in life.”

  He was deeply attached to all his relatives. When Viviane’s children arrived later, he treated them as his own. Whenever he was in Europe he remained in constant touch with his family. He telephoned them daily to keep them posted on what he was doing.

  But when he came home after the 1988 season he was an overnight hero as world champion. Suddenly he had supplanted Nelson Piquet as the country’s top sportsman. The dangers of excess were apparent. He had girls throwing themselves at him and all the temptations he could imagine.

  He was also richer than he had ever been. The Lotus years had been relatively poorly paid. His 1988 salary for McLaren was around the $8 million mark. He is said to have earned as much again from external sponsorship. Because he had been born into affluence and was accustomed to it, he was never tempted to fritter away his money on a decadent lifestyle.

  Senna used his money to create for himself his version of the good life; typically, it was sophisticated, comprehensive and imaginative. “Money has never been my motivating factor,” Senna once said. “I don’t need racing for any material reason. I only need Formula One for the pleasure it gives me.”

  Senna always believed he was better than any other driver on the tracks, and he wanted paying accordingly. Right from the very early days, when he had asked Ralph Firman for a salary in 1981, he had done his own negotiations and always started them by asking for the earth. It was a simple technique that always worked.

  Because of his brilliance behind the wheel of a racing car, and his personal charisma, he kept his sponsors in the limelight more than any other driver. Such was his drawing power that his car inevitably logged much more TV time in front of the cameras than anyone else. In 1988 the world was booming and so was Formula One. It was nothing like the 1997/1998 boom, but there was more money around from sponsors than had ever been seen before. Formula One was also relatively cheap in the era before sophisticated electronics. It was possible for a top team to go racing for around $16 million a year plus drivers’ retainers.

  Senna was also canny about his own image rights and personal sponsors. As drivers’ salaries went up, team-owners resisted letting drivers have personal patches on overalls. None more so than Ron Dennis, who liked his cars and his drivers to look a certain way. Senna however kept his undergarment rights and was allowed to put his personal sponsor Banco Nacional, the Brazilian national bank, prominently on his helmet, overalls and cap. It was an enormous concession for Ron Dennis to make. But it was also important for Senna: the bank paid him a rumoured $3 million a year to sport its logo on his cap and driving suit.

  He used up $3 million of his new wealth buying Angra, which quickly became his favourite place to be and the place he really regarded as home. It was a five-bedroomed beach house on a 14,000 square metre plot located on the Atlantic coast at Angra dos Reis, 200 kilometres south of Rio de Janeiro. He said: “Here, I manage to switch off, maybe not one 100 per cent, but almost.”

  As he wiled away the inter-season months, enjoying the Brazilian summer at his new house, he was worried about 1989. It was to be the first year of normally-aspirated engines and there was no guarantee Honda’s new 3.5 litre V10 engine – developed to satisfy the regulations specifying a maximum displacement of 3500cc, with no more than 12 cylinders – would be any good.

  But all the signs were that it would be. He and Prost had been testing the new engine since August of the previous year: it had proved only marginally slower than the turbo cars and way ahead of the times the best normally-aspirated cars were doing. But competitors such as Ferrari and Renault had not yet showed their hand.

  The new engine delivered output of 650 horsepower and he hoped that would be enough. He was under no illusions that 1989 would be the cakewalk 1988 had been.

  When he got back to Europe to test the new car and engine, which together formed the MP4/5, he found it much harder to drive and nowhere near as sweet as the obsolete MP4/4.

  Honda’s new V10 concept was ‘the power of a V12 engine with the lightness of a V8’. Senna said he noti
ced most of the difference switching from turbo to normally aspirated. He said: “It’s a different technique to drive. Mainly it’s an engine with more bottom and mid-range power and torque. The top end not so much, similar to a turbo engine of one year ago. But it’s a 10-cylinder engine, so the car is built differently around the engine, and the handling and driveability are different, so the driving technique has to be different in order to get the best out of it.”

  The main opposition was to be the John Barnard-designed Ferrari, with a very strong driver pairing of Gerhard Berger and Nigel Mansell, and the Williams Renaults, bristling with electronic devices and a clearly strong Renault engine. McLaren Honda still had the edge but in 1989 it was not as big an edge.

  As always, the season opened in Rio. There were none of the Piquet problems that had dogged Senna in 1988. Piquet was emphatically shown the door: with the same engine, Senna had demolished him. Piquet barely featured at all in the 1989 season. He was left completely humiliated as Honda took away his Lotus team engines and the team was forced to buy second-rate powerplants from John Judd – the engines Williams had used the year before. It was effectively the end of Piquet as a force and the end of Lotus.

  To all intents and purposes, it seemed to the casual observer like a rerun of 1988 as the race started with Senna in pole position. But Prost was back in sixth, 1.3 seconds behind, and Senna looked around to find the Williams Renault of Riccardo Patrese beside him on the first row. Only Senna knew how much harder getting on pole had been. As well as the Williams, the Ferraris were also mixing it with the McLarens. The start was a disaster for Senna as Patrese, he and Berger wrestled for the lead at the first corner. In the mêlée Senna lost his nosecone and had to pit, losing a whole lap in the process. Otherwise his car ran perfectly as he finished 11th, and Nigel Mansell romped to a totally unexpected victory in his first outing for Ferrari. Mansell had been so sure his Ferrari would not finish that he had booked a flight home before the end of the race. Afterwards Gerhard Berger, who was forced to retire, was not happy about it and said he would not be intimidated by Senna’s driving tactics. Berger said: “Senna chopped twice across me to make me back off, but he should not do that with me. Never in my life will I back off in that situation.” Prost finished second with no clutch.