Monday 1 May 2017

Senna's Day

F1 legend Ayrton Senna died 23 years ago today.

Please click on this link if you don't know who's the guy,

Ayrton Senna


Since there's nothing really interesting to write today, I'm going to pay tribute to Senna, my favourite F1 driver of all time.

Really, the Pas' decision yesterday to severe ties with PKR doesn't interest me. Anyway, I had witten about it in my last post. So predictable.

Back to Senna.


I was still a kid in 1994, but had been following the F1 races after becoming fascinated by Senna's duel with his arch rival Alain Prost at that time.

Those days there were no live telecasts of the races, yet I religiously watched the recordings despite already knowing the results of each race from the news.

My aunt, a fellow F1 fan who was staying with me at that time woke me up the morning after the San Marino Grand Prix accident at Imola.

"Senna died," she said.

At first I thought she was mistaken.

'No lah, That's Roland Ratzenberger," I said in reference to the Belgian driver of Simtex team who died in a crash during qualifying the day before the race.

It was a really bad weekend at Imola. Rubens Barichello who was driving for Jordan at that time was also badly injured in an earlier accident.

"It's Senna. He's really dead," insisted my aunt.

I jumped out of bed and rushed to the living room to watch the news. TV3's morning bulletin was still carrying news of Senna's death.

How Senna died was quite unbelievable to me at that time.

He was going through the high speed but easy Tamburello corner when everything went wrong. The Williams car just went straight into the wall and Senna died upon impact.

It couldn't be Senna's mistake. Something was definitely wrong with the car.

At that time I used to play the Microprose F1 game on my aunt's Pentium-powered PC. It was the best of its kind then.



Tumburello corner is the first one after the start of the lap. They built a chicane there to slow it down after Senna's accident.

So, I know a bit between an easy and difficult corner.

I actually memorised every corner of each F1 circuit while playing that game. It was necessary as I had to take each corner using the right gear and be ready for it before I reached there. I also learnt about taking the best racing line when driving from the game.

I didn't go to class that day.

Instead, I took a walk to the nearby 7-Elevan and bought all the newspapers to read more news about Senna's death.

I was living in Section 6 Shah Alam at that time. The 7-Eleven is the one near the market there.

Lots of memories from back then.

I mostly lost interest in F1 for a while after that.

That was until F1 came to Malaysia in 1999. This year, it will be its last. But that's another story for another day.

I'm closing this posting with a video tribute to Senna,


The last segment of the video clip was moments before Senna's car went out of control and crashed at Imola 23 years ago. It seems as if only yesterday.

10 comments:


  1. Nasib sutak itu macam maa aa ,hilup atau mati bukan kita punya kuasa maa aa ,selupa itu 8 olang basikal punya bulak ,manyak kesian lea aa ,tapi apa mau buat lor rr .

    Itu alik thafiz pon sama maa aa ,sutak janji itu macam lea aa .

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    Replies
    1. Naik menyampah aku bace komen pelat cine ko..tak tau la nak kate bodo ker bangang ker buta kayu ker..rase rase semua sekali kot..

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    2. Ai yaa .....!,Wa Cina sekolah maa aa ,tapi Wa pon atak hati mau cekap selupa lain olang juga maa aa .
      Malaysia memang itu macam maa aa .

      Manyak Cina tatak tau cekap pon bolih jadi menteli maa aa.

      Wa manyak lespect itu DAP punya MP ,semua bolih cekap BM lengan baik lea aa.

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  2. Malaysia sekarang sudah famous seantero dunia.Tak perlu F1 grandprix Tak perlu Piala Monsoon Tak perlu Le tour d langkawi lagi dah untuk promo Malaysia di mata dunia

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  3. Alex Yoong also faded from memory.

    Sepang F1 winding up.

    So no more motorsports glory for M'sia.....for cars at least!

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  4. Annie. I was in Negara Brunei Darussalam. Alone. Watching the race live. The good Brunei TV had live coverage then. And I saw the crash. On that labour day cuti. Speechless. Truely sad. For a life that vanished instantly. Watching it live was a traumatic experience. Thank you Annie for the sharing.

    I share the youtube version here:

    https://youtu.be/GCZIMwtooR4

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  5. Sambung dari cerita di Brunei. Annie. Yesterday 30 April 2017, the famed mountaineer Ueli Steck fell 1000m to his death while training to traverse two mountains. The Everest and the Lhotse.

    Read news of his death here:

    http://www.planetmountain.com/en/news/alpinism/ueli-steck-dies-in-everest-accident.html

    Read his last interview here:
    http://www.planetmountain.com/en/news/interviews/ueli-steck-and-the-great-everest-lhotse-traverse-pioneering-mountaineering.html

    Excerpts of his thoughts:

    "What I’m interested in, this is what has always driven my climbing. Discovering my own limit, seeing what is possibile. Maybe this is where I differ from many other alpinists. I’m not constantly searching for a peak that hasn’t been climbed before, this is secondary for me, what I’m after is figuring out what is possible as a human being."

    "Yes! I like that! I’m not here to have an easy life (laughs). To be honest, when talking about technical ice, for me there’s no big difference whether I climb the Hornbein or the Normal route on Everest, I don’t think it makes a huge difference, because I’m used to "walking" up this type of terrain, so it shouldn't change a lot. For me it’s important to have big goals, big dreams and try them. And even if you don’t reach the summit, I don’t consider this as failure. Failure for me is if you don’t go out and try in the first place."

    "Of course I hope to stand on both summits, that as I said is the main goal of the expedition. But I’m also realistic and know the chances. What happens if I don’t reach both summits? Well, I want to learn, try as hard as I possibly can and even if I don’t get the summits I won’t consider it a failure at all. The only failure I can have is if something happens and one of us dies."

    Qu: If you think about the Sherpa people in general, what has struck or impressed you most?

    "One really interesting thing is how they’re capable of accepting a given situation. If they’re up in the mountains, they never complain and accept it for what it is. I think this is part of their culture, they accept the situation and never complain."

    Mountaineers like Ueli Steck motivates us to do things beyond the biasa-biasa. His benchmark is himself. If he could do xxx yesterday. He would move on to xxx + yyy today. And so should we in this our short life. Whatever we want to do, we try to move on a few steps everyday. The benchmark is our individual self.

    Thank you again Annie.

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  6. Looking forward to that DAY when infamous BN is buried...

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    1. R.I.P...Reformasi!!!
      R.I.P...Pakatan Rakyat!!!
      R.I.P...Fuckatoon!!!

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  7. Here in M'sia, more senseless deaths due to Senna-wannabe.

    Why this driver has to rev up his engine instead of just using his honk to alert the pedestrians at a pasar malam is beyond my comprehension.

    IPOH: A three-year-old girl died while two others were seriously injured when a night market trader in Cameron Highlands crashed his van into them on Sunday night.

    Adra Mustaffa Kamal from Kampung Tenglu Laut, Mersing in Johor died at Hospital Sultanah Hajjah Kalsom in Tanah Rata due to severe head injuries.

    Cameron Highlands OCPD Deputy Supt Hasadid A. Hamid said a 22-year-old woman fractured her leg, and another woman sustained head injuries in the 9.45pm incident at the Golden Hill night market.

    He said the little girl, together with her parents, and two other siblings, were looking at toys at one of the stalls when the incident occurred.

    "The van driver claimed he was moving his van slowly, and revving the engine to ensure customers moved to give him way.

    "However, the van suddenly lurched forward and rammed into several stalls, including the one where the girl was picking her toys," he said when contacted.

    Read more at http://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2017/05/01/accident-camerons-night-market/#cEm5P0mur6gpRL0q.99

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