Ayrton Senna Da Silva

Nope, Gilles was, you can argue there were more suited drivers to win a title, but not to drive a car...as Lauda put it..Gilles had the best talent of them all!

 

I think Gil and Senna are both overrated. Being fast means nothing if you don't have good judgment. Both died because of their own errors. Gil had more balls than brains, Senna had the delusion that God was riding with him. Yes both were fast and fun to watch...as was Iron Mike Tyson in his arena...but all were defeated by who they were. The true greats rise (not fall) on those metrics.

 

Gilles Villeneuve and Ayrton Senna were two completely different drivers from two completely different ages.

Villeneuve would have been at home in the 30's ... he was a dare devil, and was brutally tough on the car. in 82, he was finally slowing down and taking his time knowing if he had a good car he can win. The rumors were that he was planning on leaving Ferrari after the season was over due to the Pironi incident at Imola. This is what sets Villeneuve apart from Senna: Villeneuve had real honor, and an old fashioned respect for other drivers.

Senna came up when racing was beginning to be safe ( compared to the past ) and he took huge risks knowing that he would make contact. Point in case is when he ran Brundel of the road in F-3. While he was un deniable genius in the car, especially in the early days with Lotus, at the end his arrogance that he deserved to win was a huge flaw. He was ruthless in a way that other drivers had not been... much like Schumacher was... and drivers have become today.

I don't agree that Senna was the best ever. I've seen Senna at literally dozens of races live in person, turbo and non turbo, he was the fastest out there -no denying that, but he played dirty, and had to resort to shunts, and intimidation on the track to win. that is something that Villeneuve never did. In my opinion the greatest of all time is Jackie Stewart. he was always immaculately clean, fast, decisive and always a gentleman, a true hero.

the video clip is from when Stewart called out Senna on poor driving tactics... and Senna gets defensive because he knows he was wrong. That will always be my black mark against Senna. I know that nostalga sets in people forget the "bad boy" Senna... he could have rehabbed his reputation. Sadly he will in my opinion be great but highly flawed. With Stewart - and Prost there is nothing like that there.

 

The bold bit I will gladly be corrected on, but don't believe Senna made a driver error in that fatal crash - and IIRC Gilles' fatal crash was more a "racing incident" than anything else.

Again, I stand to be corrected and maybe this was just my perception.

Best,
Sammy

 

+1

 

Bollocks.

 

Gil was the overtaking car...his responsibility to do it safely. His front wheel made contact with the rear wheel of the car he was overtaking, it launched his car into the air and a violent crash.

I remember watching Senna's last race live. Senna was freaking out that Schumacher was going to eclipse him as the F1 star. They were coming off a safety car, tires were not up to temp. That probably lowered the car's ride height and caused it to bottom out going into the turn. Senna was more focused on Schumacher coming up behind him than his own car and that led to his crash. Yes if the suspension piece had not struck Senna in the head he would have survived the crash. That part was bad luck...but the crash, in my opinion, was caused by Senna's bad judgement.

 

SEnna was completly blamess for his accident, he didn't make any mistake, as for Gilles, that's out for discussion, his move was obviously dangerous but Mass should not have changed direction without being sure Gilles wasn't there...he was driving too slowly (and has already been warned in the briefing against it) and reacted too slowly to an incoming car...if he had reacted in time, Gilles would have taken the racing line.

 

Didn´t Senna crash because the steering rod broke??? How can that be his fault???
So we learned that both Gilles and Ayrton were overrated and that Schumacher in his prime would be a midfielder today.... I am always impressed by the knowledge of this forum....get´s better by the day

 

+1 Exactly

 

I can can agree with the statement that Michael would be a midfielder today...that is, if he was driving a Williams!

 

And yes, Gilles was overrated, after all he only managed to win 2 races with the worst chassis on the grid, his other victories were behind the wheel of a competitive car and that certainly wasn't fair to the other drivers!

 

BTW... saw Alesi on Monday evening....together with Leclerc

 

Well said

 

What a pair that would be!

 

Same here; I didn't like them so I won't wax lyrics about them.

Villeneuve was mad as a hare, IMO, whipping his cars to destruction and with no foresight.

Senna was the first "dirty" driver I remember, starting a fashion followed by Schumacher and carried up to this days by the like of Verstappen.

Maybe the sport has gone the wrong way in making the cars so safe that now drivers don't feel responsible for their actions on the track.

 

Senna's accident was caused as he lost control over the bumps at extremely high speed. He liked cars that were very over steer sensitive, and the Williams was having issues adapting to analogue suspension after having active suspension for a couple of years. The Williams was very pitch sensitive and Senna was having trouble dialing in the car that season. arguably he got it pretty good at imola, but the car still was reacting wildly over bumps. perhaps a suspension part sheered off.. but most likely it he just lost control at super high speed.

Villeneuve is a different story. Jochen Mass pulled over to let Villeneuve through in a spot where most drivers would not take an outside line... Villeneuve did. it was a split second maneuver that cost him his life. Most people blamed Mass for the accident, but the drivers all said that they would not attempt an overtake at that spot either. Villeneuve just was trying to show Prioni he was better and paid the price. It was a senseless accident. I remember exactly where I was when I found out Villeneuve died... saw it on TV, knew before they even said who it was. the 126C2 is one of my all time favorite cars, but also has to rank as one of the most dangerous designs ever.

 

I think the Italian enquiry centred on a failure of the steering column, which had apparently sheared off.
There was no definite proof that it sheared off on impact or before, but they wanted to blame Williams for it.
The inquest revealed that apparently the angle of the steering column had been altered following Senna's request.
Some portion of the steering column were machined to a smaller diameter doing so, and it's where the break occured.
Patrick Head's defense was that the smaller diameter was well within the safety margin, with stress calculations to support his case.
Both sides may be right or wrong, IMO; if the machining didn't respect the correct radius between the 2 diameters, the part would break at some point.
I think we will never know for sure ...

 

Thanks for the insight

 

Senna jumped on it when the tires were still cold from a long pace car session. Because the tires were not up to temp, the car was bottoming out. That is what caused the failure. Senna could feel Schumacher's breath down his back.

 

And you know this to be an indisputable fact from what source?

 

Shame that both died at there peak!

 

Schumacher must have met the same problem with cold tyres.

I would say that happens during any restart after a long safety car period.

I tend to favour the steering column failure explanation myself, but the enquiry was unable to prove it.

Same for Jochen Rindt's accident at Monza; the enquiry couldn't prove there was a drive shaft failure, even when all the indications pointed in that direction.

 

I think Ayrton had perhaps already passed it...he was very stressed by Michaels performances...in Brazil he got himself drunk and made a scandal outside benetton's motorhome, demanding to speak to Michael...he simply lost it.
H was used to be the fastest and couldn't cope with the fact that some young guy was beating him..but of course, the accident had nothing to do with it, it was just a mechanical failure.
AS for Gilles i agree he was at his peak, faster then ever, but perhaps growing a bit impatient about not winning the title...that think at Zolder was just supid, stupid and a lot of bad luck all together....he lost his life and we were robbed of the finest driver the world ever saw..i would have hated it if he had landed in a Mclaren for 1983, but the prospect of watching drive a Mclaren in 1884 (probably alongside Niki) would have been amazing!