No less painful to watch 14 years later.

sad

:(

Him and Jim Clark are the two greatest ever, I don't care what the stats say about Schumi.

I refuse to watch it, nowing the result is no hope

knowing

I was curious to know more about the event...
[en.wikipedia.org]

The part with the comment from the doctor is creepy.

I watched that race live so I remember it well. Spare a thought for Roland Ratzenberger who also passed away 14 years ago this weekend.

Apparently it's Make People Cry Day on Jalopnik.

Let's hope the Jezebels don't see us.

I must say that I forgot how brilliant of a driver the world lost. No wonder I lost interest in FIA after his tragic death.

see you at the finish line brother.

@Mad_Science: "Apparently it's Make People Cry Day on Jalopnik...
I was going to say the exact same thing, dude...

Quite a hard thing to imagine, doing something for the last time. Ay, "So it goes".

I can't watch this. Sorry.

I remember exactly what I was doing when I saw that happen.

It was the weekend after I proposed to my wife. We were in the living room of our old apartment on the Upper West Side, getting ready to head out to PA to have the first "get together with both sets of parents to celebrate" brunch.

I saw that crash, and they weren't getting him out of the car...and he wasn't moving. I remarked to Laura "It doesn't look good." before turning off the TV and heading out to our car. On the drive back to the city that night, I heard it on the radio.

da Silva, immortal...

@readplays:
well put.

"Ayrton Senna's Super Monaco GP 2" wasn't that great.

@charles_barrett: Well, then we might as well go all the way:

+ Watch video

It sounds stupid, but watching this with the Youtube ticker counting down really brought it home for me. It's easy to talk big about "going out doing what you love" or some baloney, but seeing :15...:14... flash by as Senna takes that final right hand turn, it's... well, it's pretty damn sad.

I lived in Jardins neighborhood in São Paulo when he died and the fire truck with his body passed through my street. I was too little to understand what happened, but I remember everyone crying and taking pics when a white pigeon landed in his coffin and flew away.

Heikki's accident on Sunday was pretty scary, just because it took so long for Speed to show his status. I was scared he would be just like Senna.

that is sad especially considering he's doing (was) doing something he absolutely loved to do, which was to drive quite fast. I was a fan(and still am in my heart) for Gilles Villeneuve. Take a look at some of the driving maneuvers he accomplished. You'll end up finding the footage of his last drive which is horrific. All good things come to an end...

The day Formula One died.

Every hair on my body is standing up. I'm going to go have a scotch and be glad for the opportunity to do so.

Watching him barrel to his death, you want to run in there, screaming, "don't go on! It'll be the end of you!" but you're helpless, forced to watch him resign to his fate.

It's like listening to cockpit flight recorders when the pilots know they're doomed, praying to their loved ones, contemplating their final moments...

@graverobber- Same great taste, new low price!: You conniving bastard...!
Hit me with the Broadway Showtune AND Barbra double-whammy...! I can barely see my monitor through my tears... the Broadway albums are like setting a pile of fresh-sliced onions in front of me...! Pass the Kleenex™ please...

Okay, you jokester, we've had our vaudeville over-the-top fun. See ya round these parts later, buddy-boy!

I remember hearing about this in school, and it doesn't seem like 14 years ago. The car looks so antiquated, and it's strange seeing so much head movement from a driver in this age of the HANS device.

Tragic. I wish I had been involved in motorsports back then and could have watched him race.

You know things aren't good when the rescue team isn't scrambling around. You saw the same thing when Dale Sr. hit the wall in Daytona - rescue teams just standing there, looking into the car, knowing there's nothing to be done.
Wonder what the lap times ol' Ayrton is putting in on the road course at Fiddler's Green.

Couldn't play the clip, the real event is still burnt into my memory and will always be.

Druthers? go out doing something you are passionate about, VS wasting away in some God forsaken 10 x 10 room awaiting tonight's movie and tapioca treat, discussing the pros and cons of various denture fixatives and the absorbency rates of Attends "Overnites".

Give me the last glory lap anytime.

I too will now go have a single malt and raise my glass.

Whenever a great person in any field passes, it is a sad day. I was not a huge F1 fan when this happened, but even so I could tell from the reaction of the racing community that an all time great had died. I am raising a glass to you as I type....

Another sad day in the history of racing.

Watching this video makes me wonder how Formula One has been made so impossibly dull. The cars are nearly identical, with advanced driver assists compensating for differences in individual skill.

Sometimes, things really were better back in the good ol' days.

I can't believe it's been so long. I miss the Senna/Prost rivalry, F1 was actually interesting back then.

"At a given day and a given circumstance, you think you have a limit. And you then go for this limit, and you touch the limit, and you think "okay, this is the limit". As soon as you touch this limit, something happens in you so that you can go a little bit further. With your mind power, your determination, your instinct and your experience as well, you can fly very high." - Ayrton Senna

I was in Heathrow airport and had just broken up with the love of my life when I saw this on the news. I found an empty corner in the departure lounge and had at it like a wee girl.
@Corvette_Thunder:Agreed.

Zen indeed. We none of us know when we are starting our last lap.

Back when it happened (I would've been 15), I didn't follow racing. Any racing. Nor did anyone I knew. I hadn't ever heard of Ayrton Senna.

It wasn't until years later when Car and Driver ran a story entitled What Killed Ayrton Senna? that I first learned anything about the man.

Thereafter, whenever I see or hear his name, I need to read what is written, or hear what is said. Truly one of the greats.

I still don't follow racing, save watching an occasional race if I happen upon it whilst channel-surfing, but my heart holds a special place for those at the top of their game who are taken too soon. Ayrton Senna is there.

We will never know what other greatness he could have achieved. We can only be grateful for that to which we were witness.

I remember when this happened. I was in shock. I was hoping for a great season with him in a Williams, which was the dominant team at the time. He had so much raw talent. He is the greatest F1 driver ever.

@Spasticteapot: Someone should start up a racing league, with the only rules being that is must be a wheeled vehicle with an internal combustion engine, no intentional contact or interference, and maybe some safety rules like requiring a HANS device.

So basically, he with the most money has the best chance....that would actually be where you get true innovation, not like it is today where every car is, like Spasticteapot said, identical.

@anaxomander: That's how I felt. You knew you were watching the last seconds of a great man's life, ticking down.
Godspeed, Ayrton Senna.

@Novaload: after reading this post I resumed loading cd's on my new computer. i came upon a warren zevon album and of course had to set things aside and go on youtube to watch his last appearance on letterman- hadn't seen it since it aired.

from Breaker Morant;
Live each day as though it were your last; one day you're sure to be right.

I remember watching the race on tape. I hadn't head about Senna. I got home and started watching, my father said he'd heard "one of those guys got killed today". I responded "Not Senna, not Senna" and then a few min later I see the accident, I can still see that car leave the track. {tear}

Man it almost seemed like a slow, calm lap around the track. I've never seen that before, and wow was it intense just knowing what was going to happen.

I'd never seen the in-car footage before, and honestly watching it wasn't very powerful, but then reading the wiki page has brought a troubling tightness to my forehead.

Maybe it's because he didn't go up in a tumbling fireball of a crash, but 'just' left the track and almost benignly hit a wall (like Earnhardt). For someone so dazzlingly talented, so effortlessly controlled, I feel like he almost deserved to go through the pearly gates in a flamingly spectacular, middle fingers up way.
Then again the way it went down doesn't matter at all. Motor sports, especially F1, is not golf.
The speeds and forces involved can easily stop all life functions 10 times over things even slightly go tits up. Any one of 1000's of parts could fail, or a split second lapse in concentration at any second can mean death, quick or otherwise.
Ayrton accepted this and did it anyway. A brave and wild soul, indeed.
Tudo Bem, Senna.

I agree LamerX. That lap seemed very calm. I am not sure that video really showed his last lap.

As I recall it (watching it live) Senna was furiously trying to stay ahead of the new up and coming young driver - Michael Schumacher. Schumi had Senna in his talons and wouldn't let go. Sad that this was their only major battle.

@Corvette_Thunder: "Him and Jim Clark are the two greatest ever, I don't care what the stats say about Schumi."

Quoted for agreement.

World War II fighter aces and Championship Race car drivers have something in common. In both cases, many of the best of them died before retirement.

As I recall, a driver had crashed at that exact arear earlier in the race and there was still debris left on the track and it hit his helmet right before impact. I may be wrong, but I thought that was a major contributor to his death.

I remember that day so vividly because it was so surreal on so many levels for me.

I was travelling from France on a train, heading to my new apartment in Swizterland where I was starting school at Art Center (Europe) the next week. I was so pissed off that I was in Europe for the first time in years and couldn't watch the F1 race. So when I arrived at my new apartment, I met my new roommates (a daunting moment for any 18 year-old) and when I saw that the race was still on tv, I thought I'd break the ice by asking who won.

The reply was a cold and haunting, "Senna was, but he died in a crash".

Ugh. Hey roomy. I'm going to have to sit down now.

He later apologized when he realized that I was a genuine fan and not just making small talk, but that's the way I found out, and it will always mark the mood of the most stressful days of my life.

He was never my favorite person, but he was always an exciting driver to watch and a foil for my Ferrarista soul.

the day senna died, f1 died with him...

there is no more senna, fangio, clark, villeneuve and many others... times will come... but they won`t be forgoten...
true legends, true gentlemans, true human beings and true to heart drivers...may all them reast in peace and with all the glory they deserve...

as some comenter say`d before...

gentleman..."see you at the finish line"

Absolutely, positively hero material, even if you couldn't care less about racing (or cars, period). Yes, he had his faults, but doesn't everyone?

Part of me wishes I followed F1 when he was around, but the other part is glad I didn't, since I didn't really have to go through the pain when it happened (though I experienced that pain anyway when Earnhardt was killed).

This is definitely worth watching:

+ Watch video

@Tomsk: So is this:

+ Watch video

I just came home from work, and watched this on my laptop in complete darkness...

I was five when this happened, and unaware of it, until today.

Reading about him, about his death, then watching the video, complete with a countdown...it seems so completely serene, and your insides are yelling the whole time.

I feel obligated to do something positive, now. It's one thing to shed a tear for the good old days, to play a song about them and sigh...it's another to watch the death clock of a hero. If someone wound you up to one minute-thirty...what would you do? Imagine if somebody took a one minute-thirty video of you in your daily life and when it came to a sudden stop...told you to imagine it was over.

No drinks for me...straight to bed, because I have a friday off tomorrow, and it's getting wrung.

I remember this. I was 21, it was dinnertime, and I was sitting in the Colin Campbell pub swigging beer. I'll never forget.

@offyatindy: The last split-second of the in-car view shows the back end get loose and wiggle, disrupting his turn and apparently sending him straight towards the wall. I could as well be wrong, but to me the video does seem like that was his last.

Senna lives on. Forever.

this song is Played on the Brazilian transmissions of F1 whenever a Brazilian pilot wins a F1 GP, But some how "ALL" Brazilian assimilates the song to senna.

I just got some spine chill and sad filling whenever I listen to it.

Blending a unique natural talent that had no equal with a passion to win that was second to none.

That was Senna.

I agree... this was the day Formula One died.

Close to one of the saddest days of my life. Same day I went from being a kid to becoming something else.

Senna had such a profound influence on so many people, the comments here proving as much. He was the greatest ever, no matter what the Johnny-come-latelies have to say about Schumi or Raikkonnen or Lewis or whoever.

Sorry, add me to the list of folks who can't watch this...

vaya con dios

It's always so surreal when one of the greats is taken from us early.
Ayrton Senna
Greg Moore
Dale Earnhardt

I feel fortunate that I got to see Moore and Senna race during their respective reign. Godspeed, brothers. I will raise a glass tonight in your honor.

@sos10:
I will break one of my guidelines, and say "Fuck, that's an accurate statement."