David Brabham: Roland was a very talented racer

Fate determined that David Brabham was the only one who had the chance to become Roland Ratzenberger’s partner in Formula 1. 30 years ago, on April 30, 1994, the talented Austrian racer’s life was interrupted in Imola, when his car flew off the track due to a broken front wing at a speed of more than 300 km/h and crashed into barriers…

Brabham and Ratzenberger fought for the new, very weak Simtek team, and Roland drove only his third race in Formula 1. On the pages of the official website of the championship, the son of the three-time world champion shared his memories of that time.

A racer always wants to know what kind of person his partner is. When this or that name sounds, you immediately find out whether you should be happy or angry, and when I found out that Roland would be my partner, I felt joy.

I didn’t know him that well at the time, but of course I heard about him and was aware of his achievements. He was an experienced rider who could ride fast without making mistakes, and he seemed like a mature professional.

I already had some experience in Formula 1 and sports car racing, and he also had experience in endurance racing and youth formulas. I thought he and I would work well together.

But Simtek was a completely new team and it simply did not have the resources, and in that situation we all had to act as efficiently and harmoniously as possible. Both of us, me and Roland, lived in Monaco, so we decided to train together, go jogging together in the mountains and during this time we got to know each other well.

As we started working behind the wheel of the car, we exchanged ideas. We got along well and were willing to work together throughout the season, even though we understood that we had taken on a difficult task.

Roland was 33 years old, he started his professional career in motor racing quite late, so he did not immediately get into Formula 1, and perhaps he did not start it at all. But such an opportunity arose, for which he made great efforts.

Like all of us, he had dreamed of competing in Formula 1 since childhood, and now this dream has come true, even though we were fighting for positions in the very last rows. Roland was in his element, and this alone brought him joy.

The first two stages of that season took place in Brazil and Japan. In Sao Paulo Roland failed to qualify and was not allowed to race, but he did at the Pacific Grand Prix. In the first race I was able to reach the finish, which in itself was an important achievement.

Our team gradually gained momentum, we gathered information about the car, but we did not have the budget to conduct tests. Simtek never had a spare chassis and we could only work at the track during race weekends. The more laps we managed, the more we learned about our S941.

During the Imola stage we understood the car’s characteristics much better, made some changes to it and were in a competitive mood. Roland was more comfortable behind the wheel than I was, but he didn’t like the way the brakes worked.

On Friday I even drove his car: the team asked me to do a few laps, because previously I had only dealt with carbon brakes. I drove three laps, after which I said that the brakes were really bad and needed to be replaced.

Roland was happy that I supported him and thanked me. I was just telling the truth: the brakes really didn’t work. On Saturday he rode more confidently and his results were almost on the same level as mine.

Then we went to qualifying. I was working on the highway and suddenly I saw on the asphalt some fragments of body parts the same color as my car. I realized they were from Roland’s Simtek.

As I passed the bend, I saw him, I saw his car… My memory captured that moment in every detail. I realized that I was seeing a person who was no longer alive.

I returned to the pits, where of course everyone was already panicking. As I drove past his wrecked car, everyone turned to me with questions. I remember my wife also asking what I thought, and I replied that Roland was gone…

Then an official statement was made about his death, and it was a real shock for everyone – not only for our team, but for the entire Formula 1, for everyone who loves this sport.

In the evening, Bernie Ecclestone, head of championship management, and Max Mosley, president of the FIA, came to our camper together with Nick Wirth, our technical director. I had to make a decision whether to go to the start the next day or not. The team said they weren’t going to put any pressure on me, I had to decide for myself.

First of all, I wanted to understand why Roland had an accident? It was clear that the front wing fell off the car at high speed, but in fact it also flew off the track the lap before. Since it seemed to him that the car was fine, he started the next lap, after which he never returned…

The front wing mounting of my car was reinforced and I decided to do a warm-up lap to see how everything works. I thought Roland would have started in my place. I think a lot of people thought my decision was strange; people thought I would just pack up and go home out of respect for his memory. But I’m a racer and I approach this differently, so we decided to participate in the Grand Prix.

But on Sunday we also lost Ayrton Senna. The racers only found out about this after the finish; this news reached us when we had already left the circuit. On the track during the race I only saw the end of the accident, and at that moment I didn’t even understand what kind of car it was. When I saw something blue I thought it was a Tyrrell. But when I returned to the pits they told me it was Ayrton’s Williams.

Rubens Barrichello had an accident during training, then Roland crashed, then there was an incident at the start of the race, then another incident in the pit lane, and now Senna’s accident – it was a kind of series of misfortunes that were simply impossible to had been prevented. to understand . Neither I nor many other people have ever had such an experience.

Of course, Roland’s death faded into the background after the tragedy with Ayrton. They were very different people, their racing careers were very different and fans around the world treated them differently. But it’s still good that people still remember him because he was part of Formula 1 at the time and died doing what he loved.

I think Roland was a very talented driver. It’s a shame we never found out what he was really capable of.