Ayrton Senna da Silva

In each time-period of Grand Prix racing, there are stars that shine brighter than others … Nuvolari in the 1930’s, Fangio in the 1950’s, Clark in the 1960’s, and so on ...

In the late 1980’s/early 1990’s, Formula 1’s brightest star was Brazilian driver Ayrton Senna.

Born on March 21st, 1960, Senna started racing karts at a young age, then moved into open-wheeled Formula 3, winning the 1983 British Formula 3 Championship.



He entered Formula 1 in 1984, driving for Toleman-Hart, before moving to Lotus-Renault for 1985 and winning his first race in the Lotus 97T at the rainy Portuguese Grand Prix.



After his three seasons with Lotus, in 1988 he moved to McLaren, joining teammate Frenchman Alain Prost.



A very strong rivalry developed between Prost and Senna, yet Senna won 8 of 16 races in the McLaren MP4/4, and took the Formula 1 Driver’s Championship. This, combined with Prost’s 7 wins, gave McLaren their 4th Constructors’ Championship.



Senna stayed with the McLaren team through to the end of 1993, winning 2 more Championships (1990, 1991) before moving to the Williams team for 1994.

The 3rd race of the 1994 season was held in San Marino. Sadly, in the Saturday practice session, Austrian driver Roland Ratzenberger died in the crash of his Simtek-Ford.

During the Sunday May 1st race, Senna crash his Williams, hitting the wall very hard on the 7th lap, and never regained consciousness.



The legend was no more …

The Rainmasters

It has been a relatively rainy spring here, there ... and everywhere.

Interestingly, there are some drivers in motor sports history who smiled at the sight of rain before their race.

Many of these drivers were equal to their counterparts on a dry track, yet their sense of balance, and their ability to read the track and sense to minute shifts in the movement of their car gave them a clear advantage in a rainy race.

The list of such virtuosity in the wet spans the decades.

Rudolf Caracciola was one of the earliest maestros in the rain, earning the himself nickname “Regenmeister”, German for “Rain master”.

Dick Seaman’s drive of his Mercedes-Benz W154 at the 1939 Belgian Grand Prix ended fatally for him, but it was because he kept pushing even after building an unbelievable lead on an already challenging track. There is Phil Hill’s win, along with Olivier Gendebien, of the rainy 1958 24 heures du Mans in the Ferrari 250 TR. Sir Jackie Stewart showed utter bravery to take the 1968 German Grand Prix in the Matra MS10, driving in virtually invisible conditions.

Pedro Rodriguez, sharing a Gulf Porsche 917K with Leo Kinnunen, beat the second-place car by 5 laps in the rainy 1970 BOAC 1000km at Brands Hatch! James Hunt wrapped up his 1976 Championship racing to third place, after many delays, in the monsoon 1976 Japanese Grand Prix.

In the modern era, both Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna have shown their art in the wet.
Pen&ink and markers on Foamcore © Paul Chenard 2013

Senna’s drive of the 1993 European Grand Prix at Donington Park in the less-than-stellar McLaren MP4/8 is the stuff of legends, or should I say, “Rainmasters”!