A tribute to Jules Bianchi, 10 years on from F1 driver's passing

Independent

3 days ago

Today marks 10 years since the sporting world lost Jules Bianchi, the F1 hotshot who passed away on 17 July 2015 at the age of 25.
Bianchi, driving for Marussia, suffered a horrendous crash at the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix. Bianchi spent nine months in a coma before succumbing to his injuries.
The Frenchman, who was the godfather of Charles Leclerc, was seemingly set for a seat at Ferrari in the future, having impressed over two seasons at Marussia. He memorably picked up his first points at the 2014 Monaco GP, finishing ninth after starting 21st on the grid.
Bianchi is Formula 1's last fatality, with his death following 21 years without any fatalities in the top tier of single-seater motorsport.
Last year, as part of a wider piece on grief in motorsport, The Independent spoke to Max Chilton, Bianchi's teammate at Marussia.
A tribute from Max Chilton, Bianchi's F1 teammate
It took a few years for me not to think about Jules every day... even for a few seconds.
Max Chilton
Max Chilton remembers the moment vividly. Racing in the United States at Iowa Speedway in the 2015 Indy Lights season, the British driver had just earned his first victory, beating his teammate Ed Jones in the process.
Two days earlier, his former teammate at Marussia Racing, Bianchi, had passed away following nine months in a coma. It was F1's first fatality since Ayrton Senna, 21 years earlier.
'I swear Jules was looking down at me,' Chilton says, reflecting a decade on from a tumultuously emotional time in his life.
'I started on pole and then my teammate got past. I was f****** angry but I had to work for the overtake and pulled it out of the bag. To this day, I feel like Jules was the welly up the back.
'I devoted the win to Jules and he pushed me on. It shocked me that he wasn't coming back.'
The concept of 'teammate' is perhaps the biggest paradox within motorsport. In most sports, a teammate is primarily someone to work alongside in harmony towards a common goal. Internal competition? That comes secondary.
F1 FATALITIES BY DECADE
But in F1, particularly for a plucky outfit like Marussia destined for the back of the grid, it is ultimately what you are judged on. How do you square up to the driver on the opposite side of the garage?
Chilton, hailing from Reigate in Surrey, first shared a team with French hotshot Bianchi at the age of 12. The duo shared a podium together when racing for karting outfit Maranello in Rome and competed against each other in Formula 3 and Formula Renault.
'Jules was the greatest young driver of that time,' Chilton tells The Independent, in a profound discussion about his career. 'Formula 1 is all about beating your teammate. When I did beat him, I knew I nailed it.
'But he beat me a lot more times than I beat him.'
The statistics actually say otherwise; the pair were virtually neck-and-neck over 34 races. But Chilton and Bianchi had, in the under-resourced, over-stretched Marussia, the slowest car on the grid alongside fellow backmarkers Caterham. That 2013 debut campaign bore no points.
It was only Bianchi's sumptuous drive from 21 st to ninth in the 2014 Monaco Grand Prix that saw the team pick up their first top-10 finish.
By October and the Japanese Grand Prix, work was already underway behind the scenes for Bianchi to drive for Ferrari; if not in 2015, then a few years down the line. Until tragedy struck.
On a dark, drizzly day at Suzuka, Bianchi's car slipped off the track and hit a recovery truck that was moving the stricken Sauber of Adrian Sutil. Bianchi suffered a severe head injury and following nine months in a coma, he passed away on 17 July 2015.
'What I remember from that day [in Japan] was the driver parade,' Chilton reflects. 'I was in front of him in a convertible and he was 100 metres behind me in his own car, standing under a Marussia umbrella. We both looked at each other and smiled, with the thought of 'what are we doing here?!'
'That was the last time I saw him and laughed with him. Fast-forward to the end of the race… it was only when I got into the pit-lane that Tracy Novak [head of PR for Marussia] told me 'don't talk to anyone.' I was then told how serious it was.
'I'd been in racing long enough, I know people have serious accidents. I just hadn't prepared myself for that and, to this day, I have not seen footage of the accident. I don't want to see it.'
A week later, F1 went racing again in Russia and, for Chilton and Marussia, it would be their final outing. The team were placed into administration shortly afterwards and failed to complete the season. But, in light of events in Japan, the job prospects of 200 team members felt somewhat immaterial.
It wasn't until the following summer, and that weekend in Iowa, that Chilton and the world started their mourning process. As Bianchi's competition and companion at Marussia simultaneously, did Chilton grieve?
'It took a few years for me not to think about Jules every day, even if it was for a few seconds, and there's still not a week that goes by without me thinking about Jules,' Chilton says now, with a nod to one of F1's current staple of drivers.
'I've never met Charles Leclerc. But when I see Charles on TV, he is Jules. The way he speaks and drives, it's the same. Charles is driving for Ferrari, which is what Jules would've done, so I enjoy watching Charles succeed.
'I'd like to think Jules passed something on to him.'
Indeed, Bianchi holds a beloved spot in Leclerc's heart, as illustrated by the Monegasque's tribute helmet for his godfather last April. But for Chilton, mourning Bianchi's loss is indicative of the camaraderie felt within a cohesive racing team, even for an outfit as shortlived as Marussia.
Now retired and thriving in a new world of property entrepreneurship, the 34-year-old is grateful for the memories and friends made. Yet the cruelty of Bianchi's accident had an unusual way of binding the team together, in a moment of such despair.
'It was a slightly eerie feeling,' he says of Sochi, Marussia's final F1 race. 'All Jules' mechanics were there, the car was looking clean.
'But there was never any doubt of putting someone else [a reserve driver] in the cockpit. It was always going to be Jules' car in the pit lane.'