As you probably saw on my FaceBook, a few days ago, I got to watch "Senna" which is a documentary about Ayrton Senna's racing career in the F1 league. He began with go-karting and eventually moved up into Formula 1, racing some of the world's fastest race cars. Ayrton Senna was very open about his faith in God and was often found talking about praying to God, asking God to use him. But we're not going to look at what cars he raced or what companies fought to try and sign Ayrton as a driver. We're going to look at how Ayrton fought to do his passion for a living.
Ayrton got into the Formula 1 world by driving aggressively. His parents didn't bribe anyone. He didn't cut deals with other drivers. He simply drove because he loved to. What stood out to me was how aggressively he drove. He took the race cars he drove in beyond their capabilities and made them perform better than they were supposed to. In fact, in the first race in the documentary, the Monaco Grand Prix of 1984, it began raining during the race. Ayrton started thirteenth and started passing the other racers as if they were sitting still, eventually passing the second place race car. The first place racer, Jacky Ickx, decided to wuss out and waved, alerting the race officials that he felt the track was too wet to continue the race with so they pulled out the black and white checkered flag, waving it at the finish line. The first place car crossed the finish line slowing down toward the side while Ayrton, barely a second or so behind, passed by flying with his arms waving as if he had won. He was just overjoyed to have placed on the podium. Even if you're not a follower of the Formula One race, you could clearly see that Ayrton Senna would have easily won the race in the rain. Ayrton knew that.
What Ayrton did for Formula One is one of the best stories I have ever had the pleasure of seeing. He exposed how political the racing league was. He exposed how unfair the President of Formula One, Jean-Marie Balestre, was. He fought to race fairly, overcoming the odds placed against him occasionally. Jean-Marie was a good friend of Alain Prost which was one of Ayrton's rivals between 1988-1994. Both Ayrton and Alain signed to McLaren in 1988, winning all but one of the races that season. Ayrton won his first World F1 Championship with McLaren in 1988. After that, Alain felt that Ayrton was being unfair for not letting Alain win some races so often during the racing season, both butted heads and could be found during the race racing each other for first place. Eventually, Alain started using his friendship with Balestre to his advantage. One such occasion during the 1989 racing season was at the Japanese Grand Prix, where if Alain finished the race, the World Championship would be his. Ayrton went to overtake Alain on the inside of a corner. From the footage, anyone can see that Alain turned into Ayrton earlier than he would have for the corner, which resulted in both cars tying to each other and driving off course. The service road they were sitting on was designed for racers who felt they could not tackle the difficulty of the corners laying ahead and could simply drive through the road which had four sets of barriers laid out making the drivers have to swerve around in a slalmon. While sitting on that road, race officials separated Ayrton's car from Alain's car, Alain elected to not race after that while Ayrton urged race officials out of his way for access through the access road. Eventually, Ayrton won the race in first place.
However, Alain Prost felt that Ayrton cheated by taking the service road and promptly went up to the officials building to debate with the race officials and president Balestre on the outcome of this race. Based on the fact that Ayrton Senna took the service road as opposed to driving back into the oncoming traffic to take on the corners, they ruled in Alain's favor and Ayrton was stripped of his victory while Alain took possession of the World Championship. That caused a huge controversy in the F1 world. Footage later was revealed that a couple of the other racers simply elected to take the service road as opposed to the corners and the records showed that they were not punished for making the same decision Ayrton chose to make which was an outrage and questioned the consistency of rule enforcing within the racing league.
Another incident where Balestre treated Ayrton Senna unfairly came when Ayrton Senna won the pole position at the Japanese Grand Prix in 1990 but Balestre, which no one else but the president has the power to, decided to change the lines on the grid in favor of Alain Prost who had second position. Ayrton argued with race officials claiming that the pole position should be given the left-hand position which is cleaner than the right-hand position. As a result of this, Alain was able to get a quicker start with his Ferrari over Ayrton's McLaren, getting ahead. While turning into the first corner, Ayrton kept his racing line, refusing to yield to Alain, which resulted in Alain turning into Ayrton like the year before. While the situation was similar, the outcome was different. Because Alain did not finish the Japanese Grand Prix, Ayrton won the World Championship. Yet another controversy.
One incident involving Balestre happend when Ayrton flipped his race car in a corner when he went off the corner into the sand trap and then the tires. His car hit the tires and flew into the air, flipping over and landing upside down. Ayrton felt that had the tires not been there, he would have safely stopped the car. At the race car drivers' meeting, he argued with president Balestre over the incident, wanting to help improve the safety of the other race car drivers. Because of Balestre's favoritism towards other drivers, he strongly disagreed with Ayrton, saying "the best decision is my decision" emphasizing that he knew best. After a lengthy argument, Balestre asked the crowd of race car drivers what they felt and to vote whether the tires should be taken away for their safety. Almost all the drivers rose their hands and the tires were removed. Then Balestre asked the crowd who was against the motion and none of the race car drivers raised their hands. Later on, Alain Prost came into the same corner too fast and slid off, safely coming to a stop further than where the tires were. The media asked Alain what he thought of the situation and he acted as if he didn't care, striving to not acknowledge that Ayrton's influence possibly saved Alain from serious injury.
In 1994, Ayrton Senna was racing at the San Mariano Grand Prix when his steering column snapped inside the tube and sent him flying into a wall at over 135 miles a hour. Before the race, he had prayed that God be with him in this race and for Ayrton to perform for the glory of God. In the wreck, Ayrton did not have any bruises. Ayrton did not bleed any. He was killed when a piece of the suspension on the front right wheel broke off and hit his head. Had the suspension piece been 6 inches higher or lower, Ayrton would have gotten out of the race car and walked that day.
In the documentary, the medic that worked on him at the scene said that as he was working to save Senna, he could see signs of head trauma that led him to believe it was inevitable that Ayrton would die. Ayrton took one big breath and then as he sighed, he died. The medic stated that he did not believe in religion or God but said that he believed as Ayrton sighed, his spirit was leaving the body.
RIP, Ayrton Senna da Silva
03-21-60 to 5-1-1994
"Nada pode me separar do amor de Deus."
-Ayrton Senna
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