From: johnf@apollo.hp.com (John Francis)
Subject: Senna: Love him or hate him?
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Corporation, Chelmsford, MA
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 23:13:54 GMT


What is it about Senna that excites such intensity of feeling?
We see such differing postings as:

mferrare@physics.adelaide.edu.au (Mark Ferraretto) writes:
|> As we all bitch about the greatest driver of all time - how about the 
|> greatest team of all time?  

trevc@mips.com (Trevor Cotton) writes:
|>Appears that Senna is feeling the pressure, and is re-deploying some
|>of his old tactics - if you can't beat 'em, take 'em off!

So, what are the viewpoints?

1)  Senna is the greatest driver of all time. There is nobody in F1
    today who has anywhere near the same amount of talent.

If you believe this then you might as well stop reading now, because
you won't listen to anything else I say - your mind is made up.

2)  Senna is an untalented little scumbag who only wins because of
    the absolute superiority of his equipment.

Again, if you believe this you might as well stop reading now.

If you have got this far then you probably agree with me that Senna is an
excellent, supremely talented driver.  Can anyone else touch him? That is
more difficult to decide.  My personal opinion is that he is the best at
consistently driving his car at 100% of its capabilities, and at finding
that magic 105% when the unexpected happens.  The only other driver I feel
is capable of staying right out there with him on the ragged edge is Nigel
Mansell, who has several times demonstrated his ability to keep a car under
a semblance of control in what appeared to be impossible circumstances.
Maybe in a few more races time I will add Michael Schumacher to this list.

Leaving his driving talent aside, however, brings us to the big controversy:
his personality.  A few seasons ago I wanted to see Ayrton Senna thrown out
of F1 for letting his attitude interfere with his and other drivers safety.
The single most controversial event of his career was his driving into the
car of Alain Prost at Suzuka.  Even Ayrton Senna has since admitted that he
did this deliberately, offering as justification the fact that he was annoyed
because FISA (read: J.M. Balestre) would not agree to switch the pole to the
other side of the racetrack, and that in any case Prost deserved it because
he had done the same thing to Senna the previous year.  Quite apart from the
fact that I don't believe there is *any* justification for deliberately making
contact with another car when driving open-wheel racers, there is the whole
hotly-debated issue of the responsibility for the earlier crash, and in fact
Senna's driving through the whole of that race (and, indeed, that season).
I don't want to reopen that discussion here  -  suffice it to say that there
is a considereable disparity of opinions on the matter.
Since then, however, Senna has shown far more maturity, even under the most
trying conditions.  When Mansell forced Senna out of a race while he (Mansell)
was being black-flagged Senna was the first person to speak up in defence of
Mansell, saying it was just a racing incident and it was impossible to see the
black flag under the conditions (driving into the sun and oily helmet visors).
And in a couple of incidents since then (Alain Prost driving into the cones
at a chicane last year, and Mansell driving into the wall during practice
for Brazil this year) only the most ardent anti-Senna campaigners could claim
that Senna did anything more than make his car a little wider than normal -
Prost and Mansell simply each went for a pass that just wasn't there.
Sure, Senna still has a primadonna attitude, and his motivation is somewhat
open to question when he feels he is not being given absolutely the best in
the way of equipment. But he is far from being the only primadonna on the F1
circuit, and he drives a lot smarter than he did a few years ago. I still
don't think of him as being in the same class as Stewart & Clark, however.

My opinion is he deserves the #1 he wears, although I am still hoping that
Nigel Mansell will take it away from him for this year. I expect Senna will
get it back fairly soon thereafter, although Schumacher fans may disagree!

Personally I would like to see Ayrton Senna teamed up with Nigel Mansell or
Michael Schumacher.  That would really let him show how much of his success
is driver talent and how much is due to the equipment. I don't expect it
will happen (although I don't think that a Mansell/Senna pairing is quite as
unlikely as it would have been two or three years ago), but I can dream . .

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