1993 South African Grand Prix

Kyalami in 1993

## Lap Leaders

The **1993 South African Grand Prix**, otherwise officially known as the **XXXIII Panasonic South African Grand Prix** was the opening round of the 1993 FIA Formula One World Championship, staged at Kyalami in Midrand, South Africa, on 14 March 1993.

Pre-season championship favourite Ayrton Senna would secure pole position from Alain Prost, with their teammates Damon Hill and Jean Alesi behind them. In a race of high attrition, Senna would beat Joey Davies and teammate Hill to secure his first win for Williams.

## Background

A turbulent winter had seen a series of high-profile driver moves, with World Champion Nigel Mansell retiring from the sport and Ayrton Senna taking his vacant seat at Williams-Renault. Joey Davies would take Senna's seat at Ferrari, who along with Michael Schumacher would leave the McLaren team, with Schumacher leaving for Benetton-Ford. McLaren would source a new engine deal with Chevrolet, the Woking-based squad also signing American driver Michael Andretti as well as young Finnish racer Mika Häkkinen from Lotus.

The arrival of Chevrolet at McLaren has been precipitated by the exit of the Mercedes-backed works Ilmor engine suppliers, who cancelled their engine deals with McLaren and Jordan Grand Prix to focus on F1 debutants, Team Sauber Formula 1. Sauber-Ilmor would be joined on the grid by fellow F1 debutants, Pacific-Ford and the return of Zakspeed-Yamaha, who were returning to the sport after a 3 year absence.

The latest evolution of the Williams chassis, the FW15C, topped the timesheets of every pre-season test session except one - which was only after Williams withdrew from running after a heavy crash for Senna at Imola. The Ligier-Prost package showed some promise, especially given they had yet to receive the *RS5* Renault engine that Williams had used successfully through testing. The new units were delivered to the French team prior to this race, giving a boon to their chances for the Grand Prix. The new Ferrari F93A, however, proved to be mercurial during testing, as in the hands of Joey Davies and only on occasion, the car looked like it could compete with the Williams. But, reliability for *la Scuderia* remained a concern, especially after they lost some running time during the final test.

The consensus from pundits following the pre-season was that whilst Williams and Ferrari would contest the championship, a battle should develop for third place in the Constructors' Championship between Ligier-Prost, McLaren, and Benetton. There was excitement that some of the midfield runners looked in good shape to score some points, such as Jordan, Lotus, and Minardi. The two Mugen-Honda powered teams, Footwork and Tyrrell, struggled in pre-season, and there was concern that the two British teams could end up in pre-qualifying at some point. Of the newest entries, Sauber excited many with their outright pace from the beginning of testing, immediately establishing themselves amongst the midfield runners.

Concerns were raised that the number of entries on the grid would be difficult to maintain, as not every struggling team could be saved. Andrea Moda defied critics by entering once more, and securing some much needed sponsorship funds from construction giant Caterpillar. Saved by a consortium fronted by Joey Davies, Brabham gained the exclusive sponsorship of Austrian energy drink Red Bull from Joest. BMS Scuderia Italia managed to bring Chesterfield cigarettes back into the sport after a long absence, but tobacco sponsorship has entered the crosshair of legislators, with the French Grand Prix at one point removed from the calendar during the winter as a result of the country's stringent tobacco advertising laws (the *loi Évin*). The further loss of potential sponsors as the world economies continue to recover from the recession of the early part of the decade looms over the sport moving forward.

### Entry list

The full entry list for the 1993 South African Grand Prix is outlined below:

## Qualifying

### Pre-qualifying report

With 18 teams on the grid for 1993 the first pre-qualifying session was a competitive one, with seven teams competing for three places in Qualifying. As with the past number of seasons the times would be determined by the average time of the two drivers for each team and the three best average times being awarded the three places available in the main qualifying sessions. For 1993 there were three new and returning teams that were required to enter pre-qualifying.

Despite a shaky start the Sauber was the class of the field and Lehto and Wendlinger would top the time sheets, with the Larrousse cars of Bernard and Alliot being the next fastest. This would be enough for the Sauber and Larrousse cars to secure places in the main qualifying sessions. Less than a tenth separated the next fastest of Nakaya and Euser, and while Hattori was not expected to set a strong time, the surprisingly poor performance of Blundell meant the Zakspeed team got through at the expense of the Brabhams. Young Finnish rookie Salo also set a good time, almost half a second quicker than his more experienced team mate Ratzenberger. Most teams in pre-qualifying showed promise and it would appear that most would have the opportunity at some stage to advance to qualifying in the season, but the Andrea Moda team did appear to be the weakest package in pre-qualifying and despite their best efforts to stay on the grid in 1992, more would be expected for 1993 and it appeared from the initial performance they may struggle to deliver.

### Qualifying report

Session 1 of Qualifying would prove to be an unpleasant surprise of some of those drivers expected to put in a strong performance in 1993. Senna would struggle to get to grips with the new Williams package and Prost and Hill would be ahead of him after the first session. Yet more surprising was the performance of Davies, who could only manage 18th in his first outing in the Ferrari. The new Sauber team would show themselves to be competitive and would finish the session in 10th and 11th. Conversely the Footwork team continued to struggle, and they could only manage 24th and 27th, Warwick at risk of failing to qualify. Finishing the session in 26th, Nakaya was hopeful he could help the Zakspeed team secure a place of the grid for their first race back.

For Session 2 Senna would find more speed and would secure pole by nearly four tenths from Prost; their team mates would line up behind them with Hill in third and Alesi in fourth. Schumacher in the competitive Benetton was the highest placed driver without a Renault engine, while Davies was able to pull off a dramatic improvement in performance from the previous day, qualifying seventh, albeit 1.5 tenths behind team mate Berger. Lehto would be unable to compete in the second session after engine issues, but his time from the previous day was good enough for 11th, with team mate Wendlinger helping the Sauber team lock out the 6th row of the grid. 14th for Alliot was also considered a strong performance for the Larrousse driver, considering the team was still in pre-qualifying. Barrichello was the highest placed rookie, with the Jordan team being disappointed to be behind the Sauber team in their first outing. The Footwork team would be disappointed to be propping up the back of the grid, but they would at least out-qualify the Zakspeed team. Nakaya would improve on their times from the day before, but Nakaya would be over three tenths slower than Warwick in the second Footwork car.

### Qualifying classification

The full qualifying results for the 1993 South African Grand Prix are outlined below:

Notes

* **Bold** indicates a driver's best/qualifying time.

## Race

### Report

The race on Sunday would see Ayrton Senna in the Williams-Renault on pole, lining up on the front row alongside his long-time rival, Alain Prost in the Ligier-Prost. Their respective teammates would line up behind them, and prospective title challengers Michael Schumacher in the Benetton-Ford starting fifth, and Joey Davies in the Ferrari starting seventh. Prost had a poor start, which allowed Damon Hill to get ahead of him. Davies got a good start and took advantage of a mistake by Schumacher to get up to fourth by the end of the first lap. J.J Lehto would be the first to retire on lap one after an engine failure for the Ilmor in the new Sauber team.

Davies was in hot pursuit of the Williams pair and on lap 6 he would pass Prost to go third, before catching and passing Hill for second on lap 10. A puncture for Schumacher on lap 14 would put the young German off and out of the race, promoting Karl Wendlinger into sixth and on for a début points finish for Sauber. On the next lap Michael Andretti would retire with engine failure - an ignoble first for the Chevrolet engine. It would continue to be a race of attrition and only 9 cars would see the chequered flag.

An early pitstop would see Davies get ahead of Senna on lap 24, and when Hill pitted on lap 25, Davies was promoted to first. It would be a tight battle between Senna and Davies until contact on lap 32 saw Davies go off and Senna take the place. Martin Brundle's retirement on lap 39 saw Rubens Barrichello promoted to sixth and a points position on his debut, this would become fifth when Wendlinger retired on lap 62 with another engine failure for the Sauber team, depriving them of maiden grand prix points.

By the final third of the grand prix, Davies was on the back of Senna and took the lead on lap 49, but was forced to concede the lead again on lap 59 with a late pitstop due to concerns over tire wear. With fresh rubber, Davies quickly made after the Williams pair, but although he was able to catch Hill, we was unable to get to Senna, who carried on to win his first grand prix for Williams. Late in the race Prost would retire, promoting Christian Fittipaldi to sixth and ensuring three of the six points scoring positions were held by Brazilian drivers. Senna won from Davies, Hill, Berger, Barrichello and Fittipaldi.

### Results

The full results for the 1993 South African Grand Prix are outlined below:

## Milestones

* 33rd South African Grand Prix to be staged.
* 52nd pole position, 33rd career victory, and 75th podium finish for Ayrton Senna.
	+ By winning on his maiden drive for Williams, Senna became the sixth driver to win a race for at least four different constructors (having won races for Lotus, McLaren and Ferrari), along with Stirling Moss (5); Jackie Stewart, Juan Manuel Fangio, Jackie Stewart, and Nelson Piquet (4).
* 30th podium finish for Joey Davies.
* 5th podium finish for Damon Hill.
* 55th pole position and 55th victory for Williams.
* Michael Andretti is the first driver to compete in Formula One with the '0' car number.
* First time since the 1973 German Grand Prix that three drivers from Brazil scored in the same grand prix.
* Maiden:
	+ Entry for Rubens Barrichello, Michael Bartels, Cor Euser, Naoki Hattori, Eddie Irvine, Akihiko Nakaya and Mika Salo.
	+ Race for Rubens Barrichello, Michael Bartels, and Eddie Irvine.
	+ Entry for Larrousse, Pacific, and Sauber as Constructors.
	+ Race for Larrousse and Sauber as Constructors.
	+ Race for Chevrolet as Engine Supplier.
	+ Top six finishes for Rubens Barrichello and Christian Fittipaldi.
* Rubens Barrichello becomes:
	+ The eighth youngest driver to start a Formula One World Championship Grand Prix (aged 20 years, 295 days).
	+ The first driver since 1990 to score points on début (Mark Blundell, 1990 United States Grand Prix).
	+ The youngest driver to ever score points on their début.

## Standings

*Only point scoring drivers and constructors are shown.*

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 https://twitter.com/Gp2Joey/status/1722961667292570091
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 https://twitter.com/Gp2Joey/status/1723000283653906539
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 https://twitter.com/Gp2Joey/status/1723294323083493633
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 https://twitter.com/Gp2Joey/status/1723774542177264054
5. ↑ https://twitter.com/Gp2Joey/status/1724355020865384655
6. ↑ https://twitter.com/Gp2Joey/status/1724380724348813381