Ayrton Senna | John Watson's unique insight into his utter genius
Vložit
- čas přidán 30. 04. 2019
- Former Formula 1 driver John Watson chats to Joe Molloy about the 25th anniversary of Ayrton Senna's death at Imola - a race he commentated at - and also shares a brilliant insight into "three or four second glimpse of an utter genius behind the wheel" from Brands Hatch 1985
You can also check out our recent interview with Grand Prix winner and Senna's friend Thierry Boutsen here: bit.ly/2vyxUC4
Website: www.offtheball.com
Facebook: / offtheball
Twitter: / offtheball - Sport
The Grand Prix that John talks about seeing Senna's technique was the European Grand Prix at Brands Hatch in 1985. Ayrton was on Pole Position setting a time of 1:07.169. His teammate, Elio de Angelis qualified in 9th Place -- 2.845 seconds behind Senna's time. Tremendous, tremendous driver was Senna. He will always be my favorite driver. For me, there will be no other driver that won my heart the way Ayrton Senna did.
When best ever F1 driver died , best ever seen F1 died with with him.
Senna is the G.O.A.T
Fabulous human being who was fascinating to listen to in 4 languages. He was like a god for me. I was 23 when he died & I cried for days.
Literally felt like i'd lost a close family member...I hear you
the greatest of all times
An exceptionally gifted and talented driver of all times
How did John put all those thoughts so well in to words I don't know
Donington 1993:
The impressive 4 things about that lap were:
1. The effortlessness with which he did it. He didn’t “barely” scrape through each pass. The car moved effortlessly as if in another dimension. It’s as if the other cars weren’t on the same track.
2. He did it in a car considered between the third and fourth best on the grid that season.
3. He passed people who would go on to win a combined 12 F1 world championships.
4. He did it in a single lap.
Then again we are talking about someone who won Monaco 6 times. With 5 wins consecutively. Like when Webber said he felt proud to be up there with Senna after he won the Monaco GP, and someone said he’d have to win the next five runnings consecutively just to match him.
It really is accurate to say that Ayrton Senna essentially has no equal.
And the above has nothing to do with his dying young. He really WAS that good.
You fail to mention one important point: He passed a man that day who was at that time in history the most successful driver ever who was in that day the very best car and was in pole position. He was the greatest ever I believe but Jim Clark had more god given tallent behind the wheel and there is good evidence to prove that.
He also had one other, very important factor on his side. His unshakeable belief of his talent, his supremacy in the wet and a faith that no matter what, no matter what the situation, it would fall into his lap.
Don't believe me? Take a look at the walkaround the grid before the race, there was a short moment, brief, only a couple of seconds length, but you can see the determination, the resignation, the acceptance of the fact that he won, before the start. A man already strapped into his car, a look of focus, already looking down the track, before the engine had even been fired up.
I know it sounds insane, but I remember that moment, I was watching it on television, and after seeing Arytons eyes, I just knew I was going to witness something beyond the ordinary. It's a feeling that stuck with me to this day.
@@ddelaney712 I believe you. Thank you for sharing this story with us.
Indeed Senna was legendary. When he said supernatural things and visions with God during the race, many didn’t believe, but he really had a divine inspiration.
@@chrisfleming5109 no there's not. nobody did what senna did on track. ever!
Ayrton was a true inigma, genius in every sense of the word! His commitment to being first and going for that opening...as he told Jackie Stewart made him the ultimate! As John states the cars he drove were completely mechanical and driver feel/intuition paramount. His skill was God like, if he'd been driving today he would have more championships than Michael and Lewis combined...and I'm a huge Lewis fan. His actions against Prost, in my opinion where just. He was shafted in Japan to the wrong side of the track after claiming pole..he was fighting Prost and Jean-Marie Balestre, the French FIA president and countryman of Alain. My hat goes off to anybody willing to take part in motor sport racing.... but Ayrton Senna Da Silva was the GOAT!
He qualified 2.8 seconds ahead of Elio de Angelis in the sister Lotus that day! And he was no slouch.
Senna was just a different class, he had a 6th sense about driving and both on and off the track he was a special person who was just a pure racer from start to finish, it's tragic that he lost his life, but the impact that his death had is massive in terms of safety that no doubt has saved lives since. It's up for debate whether he's the best of all time and statistics wouldn't have him at number 1, but I don't think anyone can take away from the fact that he was arguably the most passionate and naturally talented driver that the world has ever seen and he came from the era of having to risk your life to be the best, he knew that and fully embraced it with true fearlessness in a way that only he could. It was fascinating to listen to a legend like John Watson talk about him and while I know F1 is a niche sport, I'd really love if OTB could do a bit more on it, it's got so much to offer and doesn't get the exposure it deserves.
For speed & car control, yes the best. I think there are better champions but as a driver & entertainer, no equal.
Villeneuve,....
Wow.it has been 25 years?I remember this day.Just sitting there hoping they were wrong.It was a joy to have seen ayrton drive.ESPECIALLY AT MONACO.Loved seeing this man drive a stick shift car around monaco! I often imitated him in my tr6 and,my rx7.😰
Great interview! The more I listen about Senna, the more I admire his talent!
Donnington in the rain, Monaco - 2nd in rain Candy, qualifying lap 1 sec. faster than Prost. He was the best driver in the rain - he didn't like the rain, but practiced and practiced and became a genius. He was so connected to his car - 61/100 pole positions. So hard to judge - I never saw Fangio or Clark.
Grew up listening to John's commentary on Eurosport back when F1 was 'free to air'. There has never been a better F1 commentator than JW. Criminal that he's not involved now.
Yes, I very much love his calm, intelligent and analytical way of commenting. Very different to someone like Croft who just shouts out what he sees.
It's funny to see people complaining about the Senna documentary as a one side story... and indeed it is... they just forget that it is also the second side of that story... the first one was told a long time ago, between 1988 and 1991... when Senna was actually the bad guy. I bet that a lot of people had feel better with his death... they just couldn't imagine that, at one point, someone will talk about that again... and then, they try to paint he (Senna) as guilty again... but the things are clear as the sun these days... this is probably the thing that made me a Senna fan: the capacity he had to live and stand out in a ambience where he was more hated than loved.
Ayrton Senna and John Watson are both great persons.
Great to see some F1 content on this, and in Irish media in general!
Not a driver myself but I always said that Prost and Senna were the best.
Great interview!
me as well! people underrated prost mansel piquet!! so sad!!
I was 18 in 94 and remember thislike yesterday .
My mum and dad who were f1 fans went out that Sunday and I stayed at home to watch the race ...
Long story short, I remember watching Ayrton go off it wasn't really a hard crash , he just hit the tyres with his front right and stopped.
I remember saying c' Mon Ayrton get out the ambulance was to the right a few paramedics were with Ayrton, I watched his head move , then nothing, after about 5 minutes a really bad feeling came over me it knew he'd gone , I just sat there in disbelief watching events unfold live on TV .
My mum and dad came home and they heard the news on the radio , that evening the family meal was just silent nobody spoke for about an hour .
I've only ever seen 1 person die in real life and that was my hero Ayrton senna , the person I liked more than anybody else in this world was gone and f1 was never the same for me
25+ years later here I am yet again watching vids of a once in a lifetime legend .
Miss you Ayrton 😔
The crash was horrendous and sickening. The cover-up was worse.
John Watson is always such a super ex-driver to listen to
Senna died because there was no tyre barrier at that point on the track. Had there been an effective tyre barrier that most likely would have saved his life.
Precisely.
A Hans device certainly would have saved Ratzenberger and possibly Senna.
Ironically, the drivers thought the tires made the turn more dangerous as it would lift the car and possibly roll it. His crash at Mexico was an example of this.
Ted Cooper The front pushrod hit the concrete barrier which it then came back onto his helmet. Had there been a tyre barrier present for sure the hit would have absorbed the hit of the the car crashing.
Yes, there's no way to know if a tyre wall would have helped
Great interview! Would be great to do some coverage of motorbikes as well, especially on Irish road racing
The most terrible accident in F1 was Senna’s! We lost him in an awful way! We will forever miss him! Senna was a major force in F1 and was looked to bring it to a greater prominence in racing!
And we loose the worlds greatest.
Great interview 👍
Great interview
Song at the start that plays in 1 second: DJ Shadow - Organ Donor.
If it was today he might have lived with the halo
Cars spark all the time, that's nothing new and not responsible for the accident. The steering column broke, that's what killed him. 💔😪 🇧🇷 Such a shame. Senna truly was the Greatest Racing Driver that ever lived!
John his steering wheel broke
The only mistake was the welding of the steering column.
There is no evidence the steering column broke or was responsible for the accident.
@@elta6241 there is plenty ,right here on CZcams.
James Stewart There is nothing of the kind.
I tend to agree the steering column is the culprit although Williams will never admit it
@@elta6241 there is Evidence from the italian court case. Specifically a Video that highlights Senna turning left but the car spearing off to the right
Qualifying lap: czcams.com/video/kf_YxtDhW60/video.html
"The last death in Formula One"? Sadly, Jules Bianchi died in 2015 after crashing into a recovery vehicle at the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix.
I think Senna is today the greatest racing driver there has ever been but the very best ever was Jim Clark and Ayrton himself thought and said this too. Fangio also thought Clark was the best. Clark did things in a car even Ayrton couldn't manage.
You don't know what he could or couldn't manage. You couldn't be more wrong. Senna was the BEST ever!
@@Nisie23 if I don't know that how could you know it? Ayrton was and still is the greatest but wasn't the best. The two things are different.
Joe, Jules Bianchi was the last death in F1, not Senna
Daniel butterly came here to comment that as well! A poor mistake
@@liamsweeney379 He's just quoting the Senna documentary I guess and hasn't looked at anything more recent?
indeed. Bianchi has been sort of forgotten eh.
he said the last death *on track* , Bianchi died in a hospital months later
@@simplysuperman6988 well. Thanks to the Italian law ,they didn't say he died on track. Nor Roland. If so ,the even would have been cancelled. Like it should have been.
16:50 this is what most ppl dont get about the '94 Williams car - the car was continued to be developed with active suspension and suddenly with not much time left to the '94 season starting it was suddenly said 'nope, its back to springs and shocks for you' and in a very very limited time they had to test and bodge some solution which can work and be able to race, but the solutions were far from honed out, so this is why the car was so so so much problematic and Ayrton with his entire brilliance and genious could hardly tame it, and many times he just couldnt and lost it spinning, so this also could be one of the many root causes even for the crash ending his life.
Wrong. Yes the car was horrible and un-driveable but Senna didn't lose control. The steering column broke and he ended up with a steering wheel on his hand, off the car. That's why he couldn't turn the corner and crashed.
My opinion,, Gilles Villeneuve was the fastest driver to ever exist..confirmed by Niki lauda.
Niki Lauda has never confirmed" Gilles Villeneuve was the fastest driver"
true.. and senna still have the fastest qualify lap 1.5 faster than prost! lol!
and much more records never broken!
Niki Lauda said Senna🇧🇷 was the Greatest Racing Driver that ever lived! Get it straight! Senna🇧🇷 was the fastest and the best!!! Ever !!!
@@Nisie23 Except for Schumacher. He was faster than Senna.
Nigel Mansell, Michael Schumacher, and Al Unser Jr. were better IMHO.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. You must not have seen Senna drive. He was the BEST of them all!!!
Yeah well, your opinion doesn't matter
@@schizoidman9781 and you're opinion does😅, dimwit
Senna is head and shoulders above them all
@@BrewerUMich91 Al Unser? I think you are right if the cars are the old school cars and tracks, manual gears Senna would best Schumacher.
certainly in the top 5 of all time. but time and sadness has resulted in people vastly over inflating his legacy and so called "genius"