As if it were only yesterday... - On the 30th anniversary of Ayrton Senna's death
May 1st is not only known as Labor Day with all its annual riots, but also as a day of remembrance for one of the greatest racing drivers of all time. It is now 30 years since "the sun fell from the sky" at the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix and two racing drivers, Roland Ratzenberger and Ayrton Senna, were killed in an accident on the same race weekend. The Brazilian was considered the best of his time - perhaps even the best of all time, if you could really compare him with all the others.
The extremely fast Tamburello corner at the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola proved to be his undoing. The problem was not the corner itself, but the technical defect (presumably a broken steering column) on his Williams, which caused the car to spin into the wall, unable to maneuver. However, even this impact did not kill the driver, but the right front wheel, which bounced off the wall, was thrown against Senna's head and thus extinguished his life.
After Fangio, Clark, Stewart, Senna, Schumacher, Vettel and Hamilton, Max Verstappen is now on the verge of smashing all his ancestors' records. But the question is whether he will ever have the aura of an Ayrton Senna. It is not the 41 victories, the 65 pole positions, the 19 fastest race laps and the 80 podium finishes that Senna achieved in his 161 Grand Prix races. No, Senna was much more than "just" fast and successful - he captivated the whole world.
Even the normally extremely reserved and disciplined Japanese completely freaked out in the presence of the Brazilian. The whole of Brazil went completely "red" at the mere mention of the name "Senna". Quite a few fans turned their backs on racing after his death. Their idol was dead and the sport was no longer the same. Of course, new faces and talents emerged who were able to write motorsport history over the past 30 years, but none of them were to have the almost supernatural charisma of Ayrton Senna.
There is no better way to describe May 1, 1994 than the way Heinz Harald Frentzen put it at the time: "When Ayrton died, it was as if the sun had fallen from the sky." As with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, anyone who witnessed the day probably knows exactly where they were when they heard the news. It is pointless to philosophize about what would have happened to him if... Only two facts are certain: Ayron would have been 64 years old on March 21, 2024. Unfortunately, his heart stopped abruptly at the age of 34.
