Ayrton Senna

Today (19 August 2011) "Senna" opens in Toronto and i'm taking off early from work to catch a matinee' viewing. This is about as good a time as any to open this thread...

From Prost's thread:

This has to be said and i'll say it again here...

The director of the movie "Senna" - Asif Kapadia - was on a Motor Sport Magazine podcast with then McLaren manager Jo Ramirez (who, unusually, was a trusted friend of both Senna and Prost)...and in the podcast he said something like this:

(Paraphrasing) "We had access to all of Bernies archives...and when we looked at the video of the cars coming out of Tosa at Imola, Schumacher's Benetton was the only car which exhibited unusual signs of, *ahem*, traction control...even the other Benetton didn't have it..."

Go to the Motor Sport Magazine website and click on 'podcasts' and listen for yourselves (June 15th podcast, I think).

Why do I bring it up? Well Senna suspected Schumacher's Benetton B194 had TC/LC and was driving out of his skin to make up for the difference. He noticed that it sounded and behaved differently (to even Verstappen's B194) while he watched them circulating from the wall after retiring at Aida (the second race of the year).

I don't need to go on about it, but you get the point.

Where does Prost come into this? Well, the Podcast goes into how Senna was on the telephone with Prost during that time talking, among other things, about that precise matter.

If Senna said that Schumi's car was using a form of TC, then personally I'd believe him. Prost believed Senna too. There aren't exactly any better qualified people to know such a thing. One thing I must say, however, is that despite the fact that Senna was trying to make up the difference through his own driving to keep up with Schumacher, I don't think this had anything to do with his death, something that a few twisted people (in my opinion) seem to think. Tamburello is not a corner that should worry an F1 car, even back then.

There was no greater expert on the sights and sounds of a Formula One car at Aida that day than Senna himself...And if his expert ears and eyes noted that only Schumacher's B194 sounded and reacted like it had traction control then i'm going to believe it. Period.

As per the accident at Tamburello...well, the saftey car that day wasn't exactly a Mercedes-Benz AMG...I believe it was an Opel and, as a result, a bit 'too' slow. The tyre pressures dropped significantly and that would have affected the ride height. Tamburello had a few bumps and when they went flat out again right after the SC pulled in, there's a reasonable chance the ride height wasn't what Senna would have imagined it to be.

[Safety Cars were a newer phenomenon in Formula One back then too, by the way. They were first properly introduced the year before (1993) and used only in two Grand Prix races.

They made many rule changes after that race, including making sure Safety Cars were faster so as to ensure tyre pressures didn't fall off significantly.]

Regardless, what are CTA members' memories and thoughts of Senna?

Mine were mixed. I thought he was immense and the fastest since Villeneuve ... but a bully. I was never his biggest fan primarily because his on track tactics at times bordered on insanity. Whereas Villeneuve risked his own life mainly, Senna didn't seem to have a problem with risking other drivers' lives while he was taking chances with his own.

Having said that, i'd rate the Brazilian thus All Time:

1= Senna
1= Prost
3. Clark
4. Fangio
5. Schumacher
6= Stewart
6= Moss

What are your thoughts and memories of the man and the driver?
 
McLaren and Mercedes have the SAME engine in an era where horsepower differential is mimimal.

RBR and Renault have the SAME engine, etcetera, etcetera...

McLaren had a "customer" Ford engine. It, by contract, was TWO specs weaker/older than Benetton's "works" engine.

Do you get the difference.

Do you also know that engines made huge differences in 1993?

1993, engine-wise, was nothing like the post-homologated era where areo is everything.

I'm not interested in debating this any further, frankly. If you want to compare apples with oranges, go ahead.
The less aero on the cars, the more important the engine becomes, espcially at the faster or more undulating circuits
 
For me Ayrton is the Greatest of all time. He would make moves on Drivers that were impossible and would always go for the win, he wasn't a tactical driver and for me he was and will always be the best ever.

My top 10 F1 drivers of all time would be:

1. Senna
2. Stewart
3. Hakkinen
4. Schumacher
5. Rosberg
6. Lauda
7. Alonso
8. Hamilton
9. Prost
10. Piquet
 
Hakkinen ahead of schumi? But I finally got round to watching Senna and it is amazing, the brazillian commentator aswell he just is epic! I can't fault anything but I would of put in the Belgian 92 incident with Comas and more about the 93 season!
 
Might have been a bit Bias on that one, but come on everyone at some point puts their favourite driver ahead of another. Plus i think Schumacher had 2 titles easily handed to him.
 
Might have been a bit Bias on that one, but come on everyone at some point puts their favourite driver ahead of another. Plus i think Schumacher had 2 titles easily handed to him.

He could have won 3 more in lesser cars though...

Wouldn't say Senna was the greatest, he had a lot of faults more than Schumacher.

Think Prost was if not the best then one of the best very underrated.

Something I find strange, is Senna after his death is widely known as the best, while Jim Clark who was simply flawless and passed away while still racing is 95% is overlooked.

That's just my opinion though.

Oh and Hammy this isn't aimed at you, I quoted your post just for the first part in my post :)
 
I'm not much of a fan of Schumacher and don't think he's the great driver he once was anymore but I think he has to be one of the top 5 drivers of all time. In addition to the driver's championships he won, you also have to consider the other season's where he was in serious contention for the title.

Back to Senna though, for me he was one of the top 3 of all time. There are the championships he won and should've won, his outright pace in the dry and wet and his strategy decisions such as the win in Detroit '87 on one set of tyres.

Due to the different eras they race in, it's hard to compare one driver to another, but with the top 10 of all time I think driver's such as Fangio and Schumacher have to be considered due to what they achieved. All the other positions are based on what one personally believes makes a driver great and what they know about historic drivers.
 
I think F1 is arguably the hardest sport there is to compare competitors from different eras. There's no other sport that evolves at such a rapid pace so it is a totally different sport from one era to another. Jim Clark (1960's) and Ayrton Senna (1980's) were both F1 drivers, but neither competed in an even similar category. Compare this with boxing for example. In Ali's day (late sixties) they had 15 round title fights, neutral corner rule, ten ounce gloves etc. By Tyson's day (late 80's) the only difference was 12 round title fights, essentially the same sport.

F1 also has so much more circumstance than most sports. Stats are meaningless thanks to how much the car effects the outcome. I guess that's a long winded way of saying I think it's next to pointless/impossible to try and rank drivers in order of "Greatness" but Heidfeld's still the GOAT.
 
Spot on, Whippet.

It also needs to be remembered that, in the 50s, 60s and 70s, drivers who, today, would have been multiple WDC winners were being killed all too frequently. For instance, Rindt was a probable multiple WDC, yet did not survive even his championship year.

People also tend to forget that Prost could have easily been a 5-time WDC, losing the title once by 1/2 point!
 
I agree with you on the point about drivers often not surviving long enough to reach their full potential, but on Prost - he could just as easily have been a three time champion but for Mansell's tyre failure.

Swings and roundabouts.
 
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