Johnston wrote:
Yellowbin74 wrote:
If Hill could drag that car to nearly winning the WDC, then Senna would have. And theres no way he would have let Renault get away with all the stuff they got away with that year- fuel rig filters, "option 13" etc.
Yes but that was in part thanks to Schui being Dsqed and banned from 1/4 of the season.
Had senna Lived, Well the spa DSQ wouldn't have happened. the plank for which schui got banned was the knee jerk reaction to Sennas accident, no fatal accident no plank, no plank no DSQ.
Had Senna lived the grid order would have likely been different in Silverstone and therefore likely no black flag, no DSQ and no ban for ignoring it.
So the advantage of 40 unanswered points likely wouldn't have happened. Unless you think Schui would have finished out of the points or crashed in all those races.
Of course Benetton might have been DSQ'd altogether for the fuel rig if it's to be believed they were saved as Schui was seen to be the star to replace senna. But then again Flavio and Bernie were tight so maybe not.
Unfortunately, we can't ever be sure. It seems pointless debating it as we'll never all agree, we still do it though because we enjoy it.
We can't say for certain these events wouldn't have happened if Senna had lived. He helped reform the GPDA the morning of his death because of Ratzenberger's death. Had there been no accidents for Barrichello and Ratzenberger and Senna survived, we might be able to say more so that certain events may not have transpired.
I believe Schumacher would have still won the WDC that year, but in a different way. 1995 would have been a closer year as Senna would have developed a more comfortable car. Schumacher with Renault power would have been competing close to him. Hard to call, but I would still go Schumacher.
It would then be a tough call as to who Ferrari went for, the rising star or the established star potentially starting to fade by that point. On recent history, probably Senna as Schumacher might have been too much of a gamble. Schumi then would have either moved to McLaren and wanted to build the team around him there (Ron might not have played ball as much as Jean did) or do a Vettel and stick with a fast Benetton. Either way, I still personally believe had Senna not won in 1994 or 1995, he probably wouldn't have won another WDC. History was too stacked against him.