Ayrton Senna

Senna was born in São Paulo, Brazil, into a wealthy family. His father built him his first go-kart using a lawnmower engine, and Senna entered his first kart race at 13. He won the South American Kart Championship in 1977 and contested the Karting World Championship five times, finishing runner-up in 1979 and 1980.

In 1981, Senna moved to England to pursue open-wheel racing, winning both the British and Townsend Thoresen Formula Ford 1600 championships in his debut season with Van Diemen. He dominated the British Formula Ford 2000 championship in 1982, winning 15 of 17 races. The 1983 British Formula Three Championship brought him into direct contest with Martin Brundle in a closely fought battle won at the final round. Senna also won the inaugural Macau Formula Three Grand Prix that November.

Senna made his Formula One debut with Toleman at the 1984 Brazilian Grand Prix. His most vivid performance of the year came at Monaco, where in torrential rain he climbed from 13th on the grid to second, closing rapidly on race leader Alain Prost before the race was controversially stopped on lap 31. He finished the rookie season ninth in the championship with 13 points.

He moved to Lotus for 1985, taking his maiden pole position and victory at the rain-affected Portuguese Grand Prix, winning by over a minute after lapping all but third place. He described it as the best drive of his career. He remained at Lotus through 1987, winning additional races and establishing himself as the fastest qualifier in the field — taking seven poles in 1985 alone, far more than any rival.

Senna joined McLaren in 1988 alongside Alain Prost, driving the Honda-powered MP4/4. Together they won 15 of 16 Grands Prix that season. Senna took eight wins — beating the then-record of seven wins in a season jointly held by Jim Clark and Prost — and won his first championship by three points. His 13 pole positions also set a new record.

The rivalry with Prost intensified in 1989 into open animosity. At the penultimate round in Japan, Prost turned in on Senna at the chicane; both cars stopped. Senna received a push-start, rejoined the race, won, but was disqualified for cutting the chicane. Prost took the championship. The following year, Prost had moved to Ferrari, and at the same corner in Japan, Senna — starting from pole on the dirty side of the grid — drove deliberately into Prost at the start of the race, both cars retiring. Senna secured the championship. He later admitted the collision was intentional, an act of payback for 1989.

Senna took his third and final title in 1991, winning seven races. The dominant Williams-Renault combination thereafter limited his wins at McLaren, but he collected a record-breaking sixth Monaco Grand Prix victory in 1993, breaking the tie with Graham Hill. He finished that season as runner-up to Prost for the championship.

For 1994, Senna joined Williams to replace the retiring Prost. The FIA's ban on electronic driver aids had left the Williams FW16 difficult to drive, and Senna openly expressed concern about the safety of the season ahead. He took pole position at each of the first three races but retired from all three.

On 1 May 1994, during the seventh lap of the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola, Senna's FW16 veered off the track at the high-speed Tamburello corner and struck a concrete wall. He was airlifted to hospital in Bologna and pronounced dead that evening. Medical examination found fatal skull fractures, brain injuries, and a ruptured temporal artery. A subsequent investigation focused on a modified steering column that had been welded together the night before the race after Senna requested a steering wheel adjustment. Italian criminal proceedings continued for over a decade; engineering director Patrick Head was ultimately found culpable for the modification but protected by the statute of limitations.

The weekend had already been marked by the death of Austrian driver Roland Ratzenberger in qualifying — the sport's first fatality since 1982. Senna's death prompted sweeping safety reforms across Formula One. He was the last fatality in the World Championship until Jules Bianchi in 2014.

Senna's state funeral in São Paulo was attended by more than one million people, and three days of national mourning were declared in Brazil. He remains a national hero, and the Ayrton Senna Institute, founded by his family, has supported the education of more than 20 million Brazilian children.

His final career statistics — 41 wins, 65 pole positions, 19 fastest laps, and 80 podiums — still place him among the most decorated drivers in the sport's history. Senna was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2000. His wet-weather drives at the 1984 Monaco Grand Prix, the 1985 Portuguese Grand Prix, and the 1993 European Grand Prix at Donington Park are regularly cited among the greatest individual performances in Formula One history.