If Senna had lived

[Dario Resta]

"B194 was as legal as any other car out there".

Are you including Senna's car????

Irish, you may know differently, but as far as I am aware, the FIA didn't examine the computer source code on any other cars than the Benetton, Ferrari and McLaren, so who knows?

 

[GeoffP]

But then,what do I know.

That's no good - I was about to ask for some investment advice

 

[TN23]

I personally would have expected Senna to take the 1994 World Championship if all other events would have remained the same. But, would Schumacher have dared overtake Senna on the parade lap at Silverstone? How would Senna have dealt with three DNFs at the start of the year? There are many other questions that could be examined in this way. What if there were tyres at Tamburello, something which, despite several conferences with Gerhard Berger and the circuit manager at that very corner, was never debated? What if Senna had given the race a miss because of his emotions that weekend?

I would have expected Senna to have won at Monaco, Spain (Schumacher's gearbox virtually packed up), Britain, Italy, Portugal (Where Schumacher was excluded) and Japan at least- but was the Benetton even then too pacy?

As for 1995, it has been said that the Williams was quicker than the Benetton, but Williams strategy and many mistakes by Hill and Coulthard (as well as some great driving by Schumacher) meant that Schumacher won the world championship.

Would Senna have gone to Ferrari in 1996 instead of Schumacher? Possibly. But Senna had a tendency to hang on to a drive for a bit too long. Senna stayed with McLaren two years too long after resigning in 1991, and he kept faith with Lotus in 1987 when he had seemingly already realised that he wasn't going to win the World Championship with them- despite a seat at McLaren being pretty available. Its questionable whether Senna, having got himself into a Williams after two years of hard trying, would have left so easily. If so, Senna would probably never have won the title again. But, if he had stayed at Williams, then he would surely have won the 1996 title- and wouldn't have made the mess Villeneuve seemed to make of winning the championship in 1997, surely?

There are too many questions ultimately. He could well have stayed on three, but there was the potential for a maximum of seven.

 

[teabagyokel]

As a thought experiment, lets say Fernando Alonso was tragically killed on the way home from the 2007 Malaysian Grand Prix, having just completed a one-two ahead of Lewis Hamilton.

Well, surely he would have gone on to win the 2007 and 2008 titles, since he was faster than Lewis in the first two races, and Lewis took both titles.

Then, maybe with the speed of McLaren in 2010, he would have taken another title there too.

So our hypothetical not-Fernando is perhaps a five year champion today.

Could Senna have fallen out with Sir Frank Williams/Patrick Head and quit F1? Feasible.
Could Senna have fallen out with Adrian Newey who buggers off to McLaren two years early? Possible.
Could Senna have lost the 1994 or 1995 World Championships to Michael Schumacher? Absolutely.

Lets not make assumptions.

 

[Jos the Boss]

I remember seeing somewhere that had there been more challenge for schumi he would of went to a better team like Mclaren, so with Adrian Newey and possibly Brawn and Byrne that could be even more better and Senna would have been beaten sooner or later, I think Schumi screwed up so much in 94 because he wasn't under so much pressure and personally he would of won in 95 but Senna would of had at least 1 or 2 more in the Williams possibly 96 and 97.

 

[F1Yorkshire]

Another ending to the sentence "if Senna had lived..." is that Roland Ratzenburger's death was "driver error" and a "rookie mistake" and someone would have died in the subsequent 16 years.

This is a very key point.

Ratzenburgers death was unfortunate but it didn't have the same impact as Senna's the next day. Would the drastic change in regulations have come into effect? The cars were inherently unstable that year due to the removal of active suspension so more drivers could have been killed that season or suffered injury.

F1 has always been dangerous but it took the death of a legend to make it one of the safest forms of motorsport today.

 

[Slyboogy]

I for one don't think Senna would have won the championship in 1994, he wasn't in the right state of mind judging by things, Schumacher I very much doubt would have made the mistakes, plus Schumacher was quite a bit ahead of Senna in the points standings when Senna past on.

He probably would have won in 1995 as that car was great, but I think he would have moved to Ferrari or retired after that as he was already thinking of quitting.

TBY made some very good points in the article...

As did Galahad, change the events on one bit of history and you have changed a whole lot of other events.