MIND GAMES
Senna knew winning isn't everything
NOVEMBER 12, 2010
BY CLYDE BROLIN
http://www.grandprix.com/ft/ft22800.html
Ayrton Senna Japanese GP 1989
© The Cahier Archive
Truly great drivers, it is said, have spare mental capacity. The concentration they need to
find the limit is not all-consuming and they have brainpower left to devise tactics or pester
the pit wall for information about action elsewhere. Such ability will be crucial for the 2010
title challengers in Abu Dhabi this weekend.
But Ayrton Senna took it a step further. Away from the track he found yet more
cerebral volume available - so he filled it with his passion for the wider world and
despair at its injustices.
You'd think F1 drivers have a better chance than most to see the world, visiting 20 countries a
year. But workloads are high and most rarely have time to venture out of the hotel or the
paddock. It was a standard journey between those two havens that led to Jenson Button
making the front pages at Interlagos.
Yet on a weekend when the real world dared butt in on Formula 1's lofty towers, the premiere
of the new Senna movie was especially timely. He may have grown up in wealth and comfort
yet what he saw on his travels disturbed him - especially in his home nation, where the gap
between rich and poor has long been colossal.
"The wealthy can no longer continue to live on an island in a sea of poverty," he
memorably said in 1993. "We are all breathing the same air. People have to have a
chance, a basic chance at least. A chance of education, nutrition, medical care. If this
does not begin to happen then there is little hope for the future and little wonder that
the problems become greater and that sometimes violence arises."
The isolation of F1's protected environment was driven home to me during an attempt to
drive home from Interlagos practice a few years ago. Our car had stopped at exactly the same
traffic lights as Button's ambush, when out of the darkness of the adjacent favela (Sao Paulo's
many shantytowns) came, yes, a group of teenagers with guns.
This is a common occurrence and locals know to open their doors and give them what they
want. But when they targeted us our European driver reacted, naturally enough, by trying to
get away, even though the traffic ahead ensured there was no escape. You need a police
driver who doesn't care about smashing up six other cars to do that.
Brazilian GP 2008
© The Cahier Archive
Now angry, one guy tried to kick the passenger door in before firing shots in the air, by which
time it felt rather too late for the pleasantries of offering up our stuff. All we could do was
duck and for second after agonising second we lay there like lemons, utterly helpless and
simply hoping not to hear another bang.
The gang paused, most likely thinking it would be more trouble than it was worth to waste
more ammunition on these clueless, cowering foreigners and block the traffic. When the
lights changed and a gap opened up ahead, our driver floored it.
Lucky? You bet. Like Button I am, to quote Bernie Ecclestone, 'a soft touch and not too
bright' hence the attack. But I add that story to the others from the weekend only to illustrate
the inevitable conclusion of global policy that continues to make the rich richer and the poor
poorer. No nation can scoff at Brazil any more as the gaps rapidly widen everywhere, even in
the self-righteous West.
It's obvious why these kids, who have precisely nothing in material terms, think their only
way out is to grab from someone who has everything. They have been no more misled about
what really matters than a grand prix world that believes its own hype about the power it
wields. When F1 meets favela there is only one winner. In the real world version of 'paper,
stone and scissors', pistol trumps pitpass.
The sport's big players now routinely employ armed guards in Brazil, confirming how
perceptive Senna's point remains long after his death. Ayrton would also have known this is
merely a sticking plaster for a gaping wound. The way things are heading the rich few may
indeed end up with 'everything' the world over. But if they can enjoy it only within a prison
of their own making encircled by high walls, security fences and bodyguards, is that really
worth having?
Ayrton Senna, Brazilian GP 1991
© The Cahier Archive
Senna loved winning too, of course: he was obsessed by it as champions are. But what
separates him is that he came to realise there was more to life - and that is why people
are making films about him today. He had the visionary mystique to know in a world of
plenty you do not have to have 'have-nots' to have 'haves'.
His trainer Josef Leberer told me: "During my first year with Ayrton we were driving through
Sao Paulo when we saw a favela and I asked how he felt when he saw these people. He said it
was very hard for him and it hurt a lot, but that you have to be powerful to effect any real
change and he was not there yet.
"He was already doing things for the children even if none of it had become public
knowledge. That convinced me he was capable of great things because he wasn't doing it for
the benefit of sponsors or for photo-shoots. He wanted to do it.
"His sport became a vehicle for him to reach a position to help change the world. That
wasn't the case when he started as an 18-year-old, but he had a driving force that kept
him going. The more he did it the more he found out why. He was a sensitive man and a
thinker who carried a lot in his head. He saw the real world and he could see there was
so little he could do to change any of it. So his approach was to change himself."
Ayrton Senna, Belgian GP 1993
© The Cahier Archive
This message, 'Be the change you want to see in the world', was Gandhi's. It's aimed at
everyone but the impact is greater still if the world is watching your every move as a
sporting superstar. It seems this was an increasing motivation for Senna, even if his
methods were not always quite so saintly on track.
Senna went on to use part of his wealth from motor racing to start a foundation for
underprivileged children (see http://www.sennaworld.com/asf.html)
. Under the considerable guidance of sister Viviane, over ten million young Brazilians have
benefited since Ayrton's death.
If only he were still with us, some reckon Senna could have used his status to move into a
very different world after racing. McLaren colleague and confidant Jo Ramirez says: "I
expected him to finish his career with Ferrari. Then I'd have seen him doing something in
Brazil to help his people and the children. Ayrton felt fortunate to be born into a good family
with everything on his plate. He made good use of it but he always thought everybody should
have a chance.
"He was so proud of being Brazilian so I always saw him doing something big within Brazil government, who knows? Ayrton had some very strong views against certain branches of
authority so he would undoubtedly have had strong feelings about what happens today. He
would have succeeded because he was so loved by people."
Tributes to Senna, San Marino GP 1995
© The Cahier Archive
The feeling was mutual, which is why Senna would surely have made a formidable, if
atypical, politician. He was well known for his battles with the F1 authorities - as the new
movie highlights - but his insights were not limited to sport. He knew it was only his
privileged upbringing that allowed him to make free choices in life but he clearly wished
more could benefit from such an empowering situation.
If everyone took the chance to 'be the change they want to see', problem solved. But it can
often take a Senna to kickstart the process. Unfortunately, standing up against any prevailing
mentality requires courage no matter how public the stage. Muhammad Ali had the perfect
combination of charisma and global profile but even his legendary achievements came at
great personal cost. So it's unrealistic to expect too much of our sporting heroes when their
main priorities lie elsewhere.
That view is even shared by one of few modern sportsmen to take a stand on a matter of
principle. Zimbabwe cricketer Henry Olonga protested alongside team-mate Andy
Flower against Robert Mugabe's regime by taking the field wearing black armbands
marking the 'death of democracy' in the nation hosting the World Cup in 2003. They
were duly forced into exile.
"Most sportsmen are usually thinking of self-preservation," says Olonga. "You have to get fit
enough to make the team, then you have to take care of your back financially with a contract
and endorsements. So it's an inward, insular worldview. It's not their fault, it's the nature of
the business.
"Andy and I took a stance because our conscience wouldn't allow us to take the field in
that environment. But it's one thing for that thought to enter your mind. To follow
through and transfer it into action was the hard part. I watched Gladiator with Russell
Crowe looking macho and challenging the king. It looks good in the movies but in real life
it's a different story. Still, that emboldened me and gave me the impulse to think, 'I can do
this.' Somewhere in each man is a desire to stand up against tyranny. It helped that I
wasn't doing it alone, of course..."
Ayrton Senna's real life looks just as good in the movies, but it's no surprise his like does not
crop up very often. Here's hoping, regardless. Only a handful of sportsmen can truly
command the world's attention at any one time - but the winner of the 2010 F1 world
championship will be one. You never know, perhaps they will earn the right to a film 20
years down the line too. The step from champion to legend may not be for everyone but it's
open to anyone.
Clyde Brolin is the author of 'Overdrive - Formula 1 in the Zone'
www.overdrivef1.com
See Ayrton Senna Foundation http://www.sennaworld.com/