How to Build a Car: The Autobiography of the World’s Greatest Formula 1 Designer

by Adrian Newey

The seventh lap was when the accident happened. By now you’d have expected tyre pressures to be normal, but going by Schumacher’s on-board footage Ayrton was bottoming even more, sparks spraying like Roman candles behind him as he took the inside line at Tamburello. What you see next on the on-board footage is the rear of Ayrton’s car step out to the right. For a heartbeat the car is pointing to the left, then suddenly it snaps right and disappears off in that direction, out of the camera’s field of view. At the time we were watching coverage on the pit wall and what we saw was that there had been an accident involving Ayrton. A big accident. Damon, who had raced past the crash site, later said that it never occurred to him that the accident might be fatal, not until the red flags started waving. There on the pit wall we were all on autopilot, as David Brown, Ayrton’s race engineer, radioed him again and again, but got no response. I remember snippets. Ayrton sitting perfectly normally in the car, upright with his head against the headrest – but not moving. I can recall seeing Sid and the medical crew arrive. I remember seeing Ayrton being pulled out of the car, motionless on a stretcher. All this on the monitors, of course. Over the radio, Damon was calling for information: ‘What the hell’s happened? How is he? What’s happened?’ But we didn’t know. The only information we had came from what we saw on the screens lining the pit wall. Our driver on a stretcher. No movement....