One may argue if he is the best driver in the history of Formula 1, but there’s no doubt that, 20 years after that tragic incident at Imola that cost him his life, Ayrton Senna is the most revered.
Senna knew he had to leave his native Brazil and move to England in order to make an impact in the world of single-seat racing. In quick succession he grabbed the Ford 1600 and 2000 championships, and in 1983 he was crowned champion in the British F3.
That winter, he tested for both McLaren and Williams, ironically the teams that he would become an idol and end his life respectively, but neither signed him. He did get the break he wanted into F1, though, with privateer team Toleman at the age of 24.
“Ayrton tested the TG183, the car (Derek) Warwick had been driving”, said the team’s commercial director Chris Witty back in 1990. “He was instantly on the pace and ended up a second quicker than Warwick had been in the Grand Prix.”
Designed by Rory Byrne and Pat Symonds, the TG183B was powered by a turbocharged Hart engine. Making its debut in front of his home crowd at the Brazilian GP, chassis No.5 was raced by Senna during the 1983 season and the first four races of 1984, the last being the San Marino GP in Imola – the place where 10 years later he would meet his death. History is most certainly not without a sense of irony…
Senna startled the F1 world by scoring his first championship points in only his second race in the Toleman-Hart, showing everyone a first glimpse in what was only the beginning of a stellar career that would make him an idol.
Having been retained by the team until the early ‘90s, when it was sold to the US and restored to its original condition, the exact same car, Toleman TG183B-Hart Turbo Chassis 05 has returned to the UK and is being auctioned by Cars International in London.
The car that launched Senna’s F1 career comes with the original Hart engine, a spare block and full documentation that confirm its provenance. It sure is a unique piece of Formula 1 history…
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