Ok but imagine racing each other from formula 3, rising through the ranks together to finally compete against their heroes, only to be the only two who witnessed Ayrton Senna's car spinning out to his death from their rearview mirrors as Imola 1994 forever became an intertwining bond between those that death seems to cheat.
Imagine going to compete for world championships together, breaking world records together, but still remaining the only competitor each other ever feared. Imagine having accepted their fate to always die on the track, mourning friends and peers who left them, leaving f1 irredeemably thankful for the lives they got to walk away with.
Imagine years later finding out about the accident, the comma, realising that maybe you two weren't the lucky ones anyway, and that perhaps it is the greater pain after all, to be the one left behind when the other is gone.
Michael Schumacher hanging out with Mika Häkkinen in their pre-F1 days
Michael Schumacher and Mika Häkkinen standing on the podium of the 1994 Imola race that killed their childhood hero, Ayrton Senna
Mika Häkkinen comforting a crying Michael Schumacher, who was told that with his win that day he has equalled Ayrton Senna's all-time records
Michael Schumacher and Mika Häkkinen celebrating their world championship wins together
After Michael Schumacher's decade-long comma inducing skiing accident, Mika Häkkinen wrote him a letter, asking him to keep fighting, and that he will wait for him for as long as he needs.
Their eternal Ferrari and McLaren racing through Spa, 2000.
Bono to Lewis: “sweet baby angel”
GP to Max: “ you fucking donkey”
THE 1982 DRIVERS STRIKE | working 9 to 5
Michael Schumacher & Alain Prost || 1993 British Grand Prix
Lella Lombardi talking about her love for racing 🥰
classic f1 drivers as vines, inspired by @k-ky
— Melissa Broder in “Problem Area” from Last Sext
F1 DRIVERS x TENNIS
Mika Häkkinen, Michael Schumacher, Stefan Johansson, Riccardo Patrese, Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna.
F1 already has a movie where lower formula cars are used as props and the races where filmed in track. That movie is called Grand Prix. I watch that movie with my dad every year not for the plot but because it’s like a time capsule for racing in the 1960s. There is one scene that I always remember.
In this frame is Jochen Rindt, Bruce McLaren, Jo Schlesser, and Jo Siffert, a few frames later you will see Lorenzo Bandini and Mike Spence. The movie was released in 1966, so the movie was filmed before Jackie Stewart’s famous safety crusade. In fact, on June 12, 1966 was the year that his crusade started, as it was the year he he crashed into a telephone pole and shed at Spa. He was stuck in his car as the steering column pinned his leg while damaged tanks soiled him in fuel. He was freed by Graham Hill and Bob Bondurant and tools from a spectator. He was taken to the tracks first aid center and left on a stretcher on the cigarette strewn floor. When the ambulance was taking him to the hospital it got lost on the way. There was no track crews or marshals to get him out of the car, their was no doctors on track, there was no medical facilities. From that day onward he keeper a spanner taped in his car so he would not be trapped again, because what if Hill and Bondurant wasn’t there, what if a spectator didn’t have tools, what if something ignited the fuel. From that day onward safety became Stewerts legacy.
The men I mention before died in race cars, not all where F1 cars but race cars nonetheless. My only hope is that their death was quick or else their last moment would have been excruciatingly painful. But sure,“Who said anything about being safe” is a totally responsible line for our protagonist to say. “Who said anything about being safe” is perfectly respectful to the drivers, marshals, mechanics, and spectators that died for this sport. “Who said anything about being safe” is a good message for the kids when me and how many others watched Jules Bianchi final moments of consciousness before turning 10, not to mention the thousands of other kids that saw their legends die on the track.