From: lms@rle-vlsi.mit.edu (Luis Miguel Silveira)
Subject: Re: Senna's an ass! (and Adelaide comments)
Reply-To: lms@rle-vlsi.mit.edu
Organization: Research Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of
	Technology
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 20:29:22 GMT



   In article <1992Nov9.142713.8903@neptune.inf.ethz.ch>
   marti@nugget.inf.ethz.ch (Robert Marti) writes:

   In article <433@rehab1.UUCP>, dans@rehab1.UUCP (Dan Schein) writes
   on the Senna-Mansell incident:
   |> What an ass! Based on the final race accidents that Senna has
   |> been involved in the last few years, I tend to think 'he took
   |> Nigel out'! Why not? He had nothing to lose, it seems that unless
   |> Senna had some kind of a failure (brakes?) he was just driving
   |> over his head.

   The way I see it, there are two possibilities:
   1) Senna punted Mansell off on purpose.  Considering Senna's track
      record, I have to agree with Dan that this is (unfortunately)
      a very real possibility.
   2) Senna made a stupid mistake.  This would be extremely embarrassing,
      considering how he intimidated Schumacher for his taking the
      inside line at Magny Cours and bumping into Senna.  (Btw: I'm
      convinced that Senna could have avoided that accident but just
      didn't give a damn.)

   Either way, Dan Schein's subject line seems to hit the nail right
   on its head.


Not being a Senna fan anymore, I am not ready to jump onto the
Senna-haters bandwagon yet.  Are there any proofs that will rule out
the following possibilities:

a) Mansell brake-tested Senna (why he would do that is beyong me, but
since we are into the brain-fade mode accusations :-).

b) Mansell's car had some sort of problem (as reported in the net
there was mention of traction control problems which may have caused a
sudden deceleration)


Let us take it easy.  Maybe Senna is in fact guilty.  But maybe he
only shares the guilt, on maybe even he is at no fault this time
(remember Canada and how Mansell was so upset; I think that a fair
amount of people now believe Senna had no role in that incident
either).

In any case the contecntion that Senna is to blame because it is the
overtaking drivers responsability to ensure a clean and safe pass does
not cut it.  Clearly Senna did not want to pass Mansell (something
about a principle in physics relating two objects at the same location
at the same time :-).

Whatever happened, it sure was silly...

Now that I am at it, I was extremely surprised that Thierry Boutsen
who had a lousy grid placement seemed to come up so quickly!  Anyone
knows what really happened ?  Did he profit from the confusion at
the start ?

What about Jan Lammers race ?  I was also surprised that a guy comes
out of semi-retirement to drive totally new cars, which he qualifies
rather well and finishes his second race.  I hope he gets a ride next
year (yes, I am a fan of his, of course :-).

Regards,

-Miguel


--
=============================================================================
Luis Miguel Silveira                            e-mail : lms@rle-vlsi.mit.edu
=============================================================================
Research Laboratory for Electronics  -  Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Room 36-893, 77 Massachusetts Ave,                      Phone: (617)-253-7307
Cambridge MA 02139                                      Fax:   (617)-258-7864
=============================================================================
also affiliated with:
INESC - Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores
Av. Alves Redol, 9-3o, 1000 Lisboa, PORTUGAL           Phone: (351)-1-3100288
=============================================================================