The Life of Senna

by Rubython, Tom

  In Schumacher, Senna had found an adversary who refused to be intimidated. The German accused Senna of blocking him in Brazil and on the first lap in France the pair collided, putting Senna out of the race. A few days later everything came to a head in pre-race testing for the German Grand Prix at Hockenheim. Senna, still mindful of his heavy testing at the track the previous year, accused Schumacher of blocking him. He grabbed Schumacher by the throat and Schumacher in turn tried to push him off – the pair had to be separated by McLaren mechanics before things became more serious. Schumacher shrugged off the incident and said: “He only massaged my neck. I was on my last lap and saw him in the mirror. I thought he would drive slowly. So I kept the line and drove completely normally into the pits. We have made up the quarrel. There is nothing more to say.” But Senna refused to comment on whether the pair had reached reconciliation.

  Schumacher won his first-ever race at the Belgian Grand Prix in late August by beating the field on the track in the wet. Senna, long renowned for working wet-weather miracles, could manage only fifth.

  Reports surfaced that Senna had signed for Ferrari for the following season, but the Brazilian revealed he had rejected the offer. He also let it be known that he had offered to drive for Williams in 1993 for nothing. Whether he was serious no one knew, but it was probably designed to unsettle Prost’s deal with Williams for that season, which by then was public knowledge.

  The upcoming Italian Grand Prix was to prove momentous for its announcements. On the Friday, Honda finally announced it was withdrawing from Formula One at the end of the season. Then Frank Williams revealed that Alain Prost would be coming out of retirement to drive for the team in 1993. As a result, a disgruntled Mansell announced he would be heading to IndyCars. Senna would have loved to drive for Williams, but the arrival of Prost put paid to any hopes of that. Prost refused to have Senna in the team. His contract reputedly contained a ‘no Senna’ clause, although this was not yet public knowledge.

  The two announcements were a double blow for Senna. His own team was scuppered and his escape route closed off on the same weekend. Faced with a choice between him or Prost, Williams had chosen Prost under pressure from Renault, which wanted a French world champion.

  Venting his anger, he ran away with the race that weekend, taking only his third win of the season against the Williams steamroller after both Williams had retired.

  In Portugal Senna learned about the ‘no Senna’ clause in Prost’s Williams contract for 1993. He again offered to drive for Williams Renault for nothing, in order, he said, ‘to show how strongly I want to get this car…’ Finally realising the real opportunity of signing Senna for 1993, Williams tried to persuade Prost to drop the clause. Prost said to Williams, knowing he had the full backing of Renault: “If you get Senna, then I go.” Renault desperately wanted a French world champion.

  Senna was angry at Prost’s refusal to have him in the same team. At the next race in Portugal he complained: “I think if Prost, who is already a three-time world champion, wants to be called the sole champion and maybe win another championship, he should be sporting. The way he is doing it, he is behaving like a coward. If he wants to be sporting he must be prepared to race anybody, under any conditions, on equal terms. The way he wants to win a championship, everything has been laid out for him before the start. It is like going for a 100-metre sprint and you are allowed to have running shoes while everyone else has to use lead shoes. That is the way he wants to race. It is not racing. And it is bad for all of us. We had two fantastic world championships last year and this year. And we had two very bad ones in 1989 and 1990. They were a consequence of unbelievable politics going on and bad behaviour by some people. I think now we are coming back to the same situation again.”

  Prost retaliated: “We have had all this in the past. He wants to manipulate everyone and to have his own way. He has done it before and he wants to do it again. I am sure we will face each other on the track again next year and it will be very important for the international federation to be strong.”

  Senna meanwhile had the fight for second place in the championship on his hands. A win for Patrese at the Japanese Grand Prix and a non-finish for Senna and Schumacher left it wide open as they entered the final round at Adelaide.

  During the two weeks between the last two races of the 1992 season, in Japan and Australia, Senna was very pensive, undecided and a little bit unsure of himself. He really seemed not to know what he really wanted to do in 1993. Sometimes he looked almost desperately for explanations to justify carrying on with McLaren. At Spa in Belgium, he had said he was 99 per cent certain that he would leave McLaren and have a year off.

  He told his great friend, the journalist Karin Sturm: “We can’t know why many things happen the way they do. Perhaps for some reason I simply shouldn’t drive next year, it’s predestined. Such things are not always necessarily in our hands…”

  Many of those who knew him best believed that to take a year off, as Prost did in 1992, and then come back, was impossible for him. If he went, then he went for good because in that time he would find something else to do that would give him 100 per cent fulfilment. “I don’t know,” he said after long reflection, “I really don’t know, everything is possible.”

  On the other hand, would he last without racing at all? He, of all people, who believed racing was in a way like a drug, “sometimes on which one becomes dependent – and it’s been proved that the human body in certain stress situations produce drug-like substances such as adrenalin…”

  Here too, there was the same uncertainty and the unspoken plea: Please don’t press me. I really don’t know the answers myself.

  Adelaide was the last race of the season, the farewell race of Nigel Mansell, the new world champion, who was leaving for the American IndyCar series. The two of them fought bitterly for the lead once again, until their last appearance together ended with a collision. On lap 19 of the 81-lap race, Senna came up behind leader Mansell and the pair collided on the slow 50mph. Mansell was livid, but the stewards and even the Williams team agreed that the crash had not been Senna’s fault.

  “Because Mansell braked 50 metres too early and caught me by surprise, I was so close behind him that I couldn’t help driving into him,” said Senna, who, after dropping out, watched the remainder of the race on the screen in the McLaren garage, keeping his fingers crossed for his team-mate Gerhard Berger. He was delighted when Berger won his last race for the team.

  But there was no farewell between him and Mansell. He was annoyed by the collision and a little with his team for ditching him for Prost. In that he had a commonality of interest with Senna. Senna was disappointed Mansell had gone without a handshake of goodbye: “I would have liked to have said farewell to him with a handshake after so many years together in Formula One. “Mansell left the track, seemingly turning his back on Formula One for good, without saying a word to Senna. The pair would never meet again.

  As a result of the collision and Schumacher’s second-place finish, Senna was forced into fourth place in the championship, behind Patrese and Schumacher, even though he had three victories to their one apiece. Reliability had been the issue: Senna had only finished half of the 16 races that season, a terrible record. It was an ignominious end to a far-from-illustrious season for Senna and his patience was beginning to wear thin.

  When he got back to Brazil Senna resumed an affair he had had with a Brazilian model called Marcella Praddo. He had last seen her in 1985, when he first started driving for Lotus. He soon realised why it hadn’t lasted then, and after a month it was over, as he played the field again. At the end of 1992 the world had got out in Brazil that his relationship with Xuxa Meneghel was well and truly over and the pair were not even seeing each other occasionally. That winter, it seemed that every single girl in Brazil was making a play for him. He enjoyed himself immensely, virtually entertaining a different girl every weekend at his beach house in Angra. His racing life may have been in chaos but his p
ersonal life couldn’t have been better. And it was scheduled to get even better still come the New Year.

  As he relaxed at Angra, he had plenty to think about that winter. First, he had no drive for 1993, although the McLaren was his for the taking; second, the team had no engine; and third, a new young rival had appeared who was fast and threatening and was certain to give him trouble in the future. Lastly, his old rival Alain Prost would be driving the fastest car and would be untouchable. In actual fact it was to turn out nowhere nearly as badly as Senna imagined. But he had no way of knowing that then. His mission for 1993 was to secure himself a Williams drive for 1994.

  Meanwhile, Ron Dennis was doing all he could to solve his engine problem so as to make sure he could offer Senna a competitive package in 1993 and possibly beyond. The key to that was securing a Renault deal.

  As soon as he knew Honda was leaving, he made a beeline for Renault and the head of Renault Sport, Patrick Faure. Dennis knew Renault would let out a second supply of engines at some point and he wanted them. But Frank Williams and Patrick Head got in his way. Twice they had seen Dennis snatch away valuable contracts they had in the past, and this time they were ready for him. Dennis, as hard as he tried, found his way blocked at Renault. The engines would be supplied to Williams for five years, under an exclusive basis. The exclusivity could not be broken. And it is believed that the contract also contained a ‘no McLaren’ clause. Frank Williams had learnt his lesson and Dennis was paying the price of previous plunders.

  But in the course of his travels in France, Dennis began a relationship with car-maker Peugeot, which wanted to enter Formula One. It was a relationship that would bear fruit for 1994 but not solve his 1993 problem. For that he increasingly realised he would have to speak to Cosworth Engineering, the Formula One engine-maker based in Northampton, England. Cosworth had a budget again from Ford and was in a strong phase. But another barrier was up there as well in the shape of Flavio Briatore, the team principal of Benetton. Briatore did not have an exclusivity clause but he had a deal whereby, if Cosworth supplied a second team, it had to be two specifications of engine backwards. As the latest specification engines would have pneumatic valves, then they would be a long way from what Benetton had. In the end Dennis settled for that, and it would be announced in the New Year. In truth Senna had nowhere else to go in 1993, although 1994 would prove another story.

  CHAPTER 20

  The James Bond Years

  Three golden seasons with Gerhard

  Gerhard Berger labels the three years 1990 to 1992 as ‘the James Bond years’ – a period he and Senna spent together as team-mates at McLaren when money, success and girls littered every corner of their lives. It is a moment in time he says will never be repeated, when life was a big game and the world was at their feet.

  And what a game it was. The two wealthy young racing drivers lived a life few can comprehend. Not only did they have incredible amounts of money – both earned in excess of $12 million a year from salary and sponsorships – but they were adored around the world and were heroes to 100 million people.

  Berger readily admits: “We certainly had a good life. Ayrton had a great house in Angra and I had a nice yacht, jet and helicopter. I remember on one occasion when I went to visit him in Brazil, we decided to take the helicopter to go swimming. We landed on the beach, causing complete chaos as no one could see a thing – they all had sand in their eyes; then we calmly got out, went swimming and returned to the helicopter. On the one side you could say we were being childish.

  “We had everything that it was possible to have materially – planes, helicopters, fantastic houses and we had fantastic careers. It’s only afterwards, sitting here today, that I realise just how fantastic it really was. We lived the kind of life you only see in a James Bond film, but even in the James Bond films there is always a tragedy and unfortunately, Ayrton had the role of the tragic hero.”

  Gerhard Berger and Ayrton Senna hit it off from day one. They met in 1983, while competing in international Formula Three, and instantly became friends. They had a lot in common – both had wealthy self-made businessmen as fathers – and both were struggling to make it into Formula One. It was a friendship that endured right up until 1st May 1994 when, 15 minutes before the flag went up on the San Marino Grand Prix, they exchanged grins for the last time. The James Bond years may have been over but the memories remained. Understandably, ever since that fateful day, competing at Imola has held dark memories for Berger. And not only because that is where he lost his best friend. The infamous circuit was the scene of a similar accident five years before, on 23rd April 1989 – one in which Berger himself was lucky to escape with his life.

  He remembers the details of his own accident as if it were yesterday, despite the fact that it is now 13 years ago. He admits that when it happened, his whole life rushed before him and he was convinced that he was not going to survive.

  At the time he was team-mates with Nigel Mansell and had started fifth on the grid. Ferrari was on a high. Against all expectations it had won the first race of the season in Brazil and had high hopes on home turf. Mansell and Berger were the darlings of the crowd.

  As Berger says: “Perhaps the strangest thing about my time with Ayrton is the fact that I had my big accident in exactly the same place as he had his, the Tamburello curve at Imola.” Berger can’t quite come to terms with the deep irony of this, and the astonishing coincidences that led to a series of events involving him, Senna and Tamburello that defy explanation.

  At the start of that 1989 Grand Prix, Senna and Prost were followed by Mansell in third and Berger in fifth. The accident happened during the fourth lap, when Berger’s Ferrari went straight on at the Tamburello, crashing into the wall at around 160mph. The impact destroyed the car, which bounced down the wall for 100 metres before bursting into flames. It took 20 long seconds to put out the fire – a surprise considering fires had virtually been eradicated from Formula One by then.

  By all accounts it was a smaller accident than Senna’s, far less violent. But even though he survived the impact, it was still a miracle that he then survived the flames – a fact not lost on the Austrian.

  As he lost control of the car, Berger remembers thinking that he was going to die. “Just before I hit the wall I remember thinking ‘oh shit Gerhard, this is not going to work out, you’re not going to survive’. So I put my hands across my chest and braced myself for the impact,” he says.

  Berger was unconscious when Sid Watkins found him. “The next thing I knew I woke up and there was Professor Watkins sitting on my chest trying to get a tube down my throat. It really hurt, so I knew I was still alive.”

  He had a broken rib, chemical burns to his body from the fuel spillage and second-degree burns to his hands. In a scene very reminiscent of Senna’s crash five years later, the race was stopped while Berger was tended to and airlifted to hospital. He says: “The next day Ayrton phoned me to see how I was and I said to him ‘Ayrton, we have to change that fucking wall, it’s too dangerous’.”

  Berger’s burns meant he missed the Monaco Grand Prix but recovered in time for the Mexican race a month later on 28th May.

  When they returned to test at Imola the following year, Senna and Berger walked out to the Tamburello corner. As Berger remembers: “Ayrton and I walked to the Tamburello to see what could be done. Ayrton looked behind the wall and saw there was a river and he said to me: ‘Gerhard, we can’t change it because there is a river behind it.’ We looked at each other and agreed that there was nothing we could do to change it. I said to Ayrton: ‘I know we can’t do anything but someone is going to die at this corner.’ Sure enough he died at exactly the place where we were standing and talking.”

  Berger and Senna first met in 1983 when Berger was having difficulties with his Formula Three car at Silverstone. Senna was dominating the British series, but both were competing in a European Championship round at the Northamptonshire venue and using different tyres from the Avons that we
re mandatory for the British Championship. Berger says: “I had the worst of set-ups at Silverstone, so I went to talk to Dick Bennetts (co-owner of West Surrey Racing, Senna’s Formula Three entrant) and Ayrton was sitting with him. I asked them which gears I needed and which springs, and Ayrton just looked at me as if to say ‘who is this guy who just pops round the corner and starts asking me what his set-up should be?’ At that time we didn’t have a clue how the future would turn out but there was a good empathy between us and we knew we liked each other.”

  They were not particularly friendly at this point. But Senna’s highly competitive nature was intrigued by Berger’s more open approach.

  They met again later that year at the prestigious Macau GP for Formula Three cars. At the time, neither driver had much idea of his true destiny, but Senna was already headed for Formula One with Toleman. Berger says: Ayrton won the race and I came third, but they gave me the quickest lap. I thought there must be some mistake, as I was convinced Ayrton had run the fastest lap, but they gave it to me so I forgot about the controversy and just accepted it. That evening there was a party and it was there that I met Ayrton for the first time. He said to me ‘look, I have the quickest lap’. But all the official reports were out so there was no point in arguing. I just said to him ‘you have it but it’s mine!’ Then we had our first chat and we had a laugh and got on very well. I think that a friendship had already started without us even knowing.”

  In 1987 Senna took more serious notice of Berger when he moved to Ferrari from Benetton. At the time, Senna was struggling at Lotus and clearly envious that Berger had snagged a top drive. “Ayrton suddenly realised there was another competitor he needed to get rid of, so he started being very friendly, questioning me on how things worked at Ferrari so he could glean all the information he could,” says Berger. “That was his way – the moment he realised that someone or something could take away what he wanted, he would focus fully on that person or thing to fathom out how it worked.”