Latest news with #AlainProst
France 24
19 hours ago
- Automotive
- France 24
South Africa moves closer to hosting Formula One race
He told reporters the venue that last hosted a F1 race in 1993 had been given the green light by the International Automobile Federation (FIA) to implement design proposals. "Today, we turn the page to a bold new chapter for Kyalami. We are ready for the return of Formula One to African soil," said Venter. "When we acquired Kyalami in 2014, we made a commitment to restore it, not just as a world-class venue, but as a beacon for motorsport across Africa. "The acceptance by the FIA of our grade one design is a major step forward in that journey," added Venter, an importer of luxury vehicles. Kyalami and Cape Town in South Africa, Rwanda and Morocco have expressed interest in bringing F1 racing back to Africa. The British company charged with doing the upgrades said they were "minor", and could be completed within three months. FIA has given Kyalami a three-year deadline for completion. Upgrades, which will not change the 4.5 kilometre (2.8 miles) circuit layout, include enhancing run-off areas and barriers. "The proposed FIA grade one upgrade focuses on enhancing run-off areas, barrier systems, debris fencing, kerbs, and drainage," a company spokesman said. "This is a light-touch upgrade in engineering terms, but one that enhances the already excellent circuit standards to meet modern grade one requirements." More spectator zones and grandstands have also been earmarked as part of a bigger upgrade, leaving Kyalami as the only grade one certified venue in Africa. Kyalami has hosted 21 F1 Grands Prix, the last in 1993 won by Alain Prost for Williams. The annual event was discontinued because it proved too costly for the then owners to host.
Newsweek
2 days ago
- Automotive
- Newsweek
Alain Prost Confirmed for Historic McLaren Reunion
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Former McLaren driver Alain Prost returns to the Woking-based team for a one-off event at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. The Goodwood Festival of Speed hosts a celebration of motor sport history, displaying cars raced throughout the years. A variety of people around the sport are allowed to drive them at the event. This year, Prost is returning to racing for a special appearance, coming back to the team where he made history. Alain Prost, McLaren-Honda MP4/5, Grand Prix of Monaco, Circuit de Monaco, May 7, 1989. Alain Prost, McLaren-Honda MP4/5, Grand Prix of Monaco, Circuit de Monaco, May 7, 1989. Photo by Paul-Along with Prost returning, McLaren is also rebuilding a special edition of the McLaren M23, which Emerson Fittipaldi used to win the 1974 Drivers' Championship. McLaren announced the occasion along with a statement from chief operating officer Piers Thynne. "It's great for McLaren to be back at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. It's the perfect occasion to showcase our own heritage alongside our more recent achievements and to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Formula 1," Thynne said. "30 years on from our victory at Le Mans, it's great to be able to have J.J. Lehto driving the F1 GTR, and it will be special to see Alain Prost drive his 1988 MP4/4. "It's also fantastic to be able to run the MP4/2B to commemorate 40 years since Alain's first Drivers' Championship victory. "It's an honor and a privilege to be given the opportunity to drive the M23-15 and showcase the team's hard work and talent. "To be able to bring such a challenging project to life, involving such a wide range of team members across departments, is a special moment, and is a great way to recognize the team's first Championship win. "We really enjoy being part of the Goodwood Festival of Speed, so we look forward to seeing it all come to life for another year." Thynne is scheduled to drive the M23. Goodwood is held in Chichester, England, on July 10 through July 13, holding a walk through memory lane for old and new fans alike. What is Alain Prost driving? Prost was the teammate of the legendary Ayrton Senna, one of the most iconic drivers of all time. Both drivers drove the MP4/4 in 1988, which was the title-winning car that season. The car won 15 of 16 races, dominating the field unlike any car before. Prost will drive the exact model he used to win at Monaco, France, and Mexico. Nicholas and Shelley Schorsch of the Audrain Collection own the chassis of the car and are providing it for the special event.
Telegraph
22-05-2025
- Automotive
- Telegraph
‘I had a front-row seat for the explosive Senna-Prost rivalry'
Thirty-seven years ago, Ayrton Senna produced a qualifying lap of such staggering speed and precision around the streets of Monte Carlo that even he found it hard to believe. The Brazilian later described his performance as 'in a different dimension… well beyond my conscious understanding'. Only a few seconds of the sublime 1min 23.998sec was captured by television cameras, but seeing the numbers in black and white is remarkable. It was not just that Senna was more than 1.4 seconds faster than his McLaren team-mate in second – it was that his team-mate was Alain Prost. In the race, it was more of the same relentless brilliance. Prost dropped to third behind Gerhard Berger off the line, but by the time he hauled his McLaren back ahead of the Ferrari and started pushing, leader Senna was 50 seconds ahead. Eleven laps from the chequered flag, the unfathomable happened. Senna crashed at Portier, the final right-hander before the tunnel. He was utterly dejected. Prost took victory, extending his championship lead over his team-mate to 15 points after three rounds. The mistake was as inexplicable as his otherworldly qualifying lap the previous day. Senna claimed that he lost concentration after being ordered by McLaren team principal Ron Dennis to ease off. One man who believes differently is Steve Nichols, Senna's race engineer at the time and who spent a decade at McLaren in the 1980s. 'As soon as he got the message on his board that it was now Prost in second place he upped his pace. He overdid it and he crashed. It was all really due to the respect he had for Prost. He knew that his arch competitor was now in second place and was going to be trying to catch him,' Nichols tells Telegraph Sport. Nichols's precise recollections of the Senna and Prost rivalry are worth listening to closely, nearly four decades on. As well as working directly with Senna, the American was also the chief designer for 1988's MP4/4, which was until 2023 the most dominant car in F1 history. It was also the machine that took Senna to his maiden title. Nichols, now 78 and out of the paddock for more than two decades, speaks with precise detail of his time in the thick of F1's most fractious and memorable periods. He recalls the first time the 27-year-old Senna came to McLaren for a seat fitting in late 1987, after joining from Lotus. 'We'd already progressed quite a bit with the car when he arrived, designing it around Prost, who was very small. Senna was a more normal size, you might say. It was a little difficult fitting him in. 'He said to me he'd been working out in Brazil over the winter and it was quite tight across the shoulders. I said 'well, maybe you could stop now!'' Delivering the MP4/4 'wonder car' In 1987 McLaren, powered by TAG-Porsche engines, had finished second in the standings with two victories but well behind champions Williams. In 1988, they began a partnership with Honda, which would bring them four double titles in a row. The introduction of the 1.5 litre, V6 turbo RA168E engine, however, delayed the MP4/4's progress. 'I didn't really want to start in earnest on the design until we knew what engine we were going to have because I wanted to fully integrate the engine into the car,' Nichols says. 'I didn't want any compromise. So I stressed the whole system. 'We arrived in Imola that year – it was the last test before the first race in Brazil. It had been an eight-day test and everybody had been there testing for seven days and we'd barely made it there in time for the last day. 'It was so intense to finish the design and so intense to get manufactured and get it to Imola. Obviously, me and my design team were trying to make it as good as it could possibly be, but I never stopped to think: 'What if it's c---?'' Nichols says. McLaren's new engine partners – who had won the previous two championships with Williams – had high expectations. 'We arrived late, about 11 o'clock at the hotel in Imola the night before. One of the higher-ups in the Honda hierarchy is just giving me this intense look and he says: 'So, tomorrow we find out about this wonder car of yours'. I thought: 'Christ, what has Ron been selling these people?' 'The next day it was a pleasant surprise, almost, that it was as fast as it was. As much as anything it was just a relief that it actually worked,' he says. The car that Senna could barely fit into went on to become the most successful in F1 history, winning 15 of 16 races that year – and 10 one-two finishes – taking the same number of pole positions. Not only was it quick, it was reliable. During a season in which rivals Benetton, Lotus and Ferrari failed to finish around one-third of their entries, the MP4/4, sleek and low to the ground, had just two mechanical retirements all season. The car scored more than three times as many points as McLaren's closest rivals, Ferrari. Prost scored more points over the season, but it was only a driver's 11 best results that counted for the championship. Senna, with eight wins to Prost's seven, took the first of his three drivers' titles for the team. 'Why do they pay you all this money?' The Monaco Grand Prix in 1988 is perhaps behind a myth that has crystallised over the past three decades – that of Senna as blisteringly quick over one lap but occasionally prone to recklessness, and of Prost as the calculated 'professor'. Nichols believes that, as aggressive as Senna was on track, this idea diminishes his total dedication. 'Senna was more flamboyant but he'd be there all hours studying all the information. I used to, once in a while, get back to the hotel late and he'd be there in a restaurant on his own having a meal and he'd have all the papers,' Nichols says. 'You've got a set-up sheet and it's got every parameter on the car, everything is adjustable. Some drivers you could look at that set-up sheet and know he's not going to change that, and that and that, so you'd fill half of it in maybe before you've even started. Then they'd spend half an hour or an hour and go through the rest of it. 'With Senna I couldn't fill anything in because he'd want to talk about every box. What is this going to do? How is it going to change? What is it going to be like on braking? What's it going to be like on turn-in? What's it going to be like mid-corner? What's it going to be on the exit?' There was, though, a clear contrast in how they drove. Nichols recalls watching Prost in qualifying for the 1985 Belgian Grand Prix, trackside at Eau Rouge. 'Prost came out and he goes through on his out-lap. It looks slow but it's his out-lap. Then he comes through again and he looks slow and I thought: 'Oh God, maybe he's got a problem'. Comes through a third time and looked slow. I thought: 'What's going on?' 'I hiked back up the hill to the pits and he was on pole. You couldn't tell the difference between an out-lap, his fast lap and an in-lap. His fast lap was so smooth, you couldn't even tell he was going fast.' Senna made the car look 'electric'. 'You thought: 'Oh my God, he's going to crash'. But he didn't. I remember in the early days of in-car cameras, at Jerez he'd qualified on pole. On the big screen – on the left they had him driving the car and on the right they had the picture of the car from the outside. 'You'd see the car around a corner, right on the edge and you'd have your heart in your mouth. Yet if you looked at the in-car stuff it was absolute serenity,' Nichols recalls. 'I said to him: 'Why do they pay you all this money? It looks like a piece of cake to me,' and he just smiled.' 'We just have to worry about the little Frenchman' The defining aspect of Nichols's time in F1, was Senna and Prost's fierce battle. Their first season together at McLaren in 1988 was not especially tempestuous, though it had its flashpoints. In 1989 the MP4/5 – now powered by naturally aspirated Honda engines – was again the class of the field. That meant either Senna would win a second championship or Prost would take his third – a recipe for tension. The rivalry became the bitterest in the sport's history, fuelled by controversy, animosity and claims of an FIA francophone conspiracy against Senna. 'In our debriefs Senna would say to me – he had the utmost respect for Prost and the other way around – 'we don't have to worry about anybody else, we just have to worry about the little Frenchman',' Nichols says. 'They worked very well together – even when they weren't talking to one another. If Prost had a question, he wouldn't ask Senna, he'd ask his race engineer and his race engineer would ask me, and I'd ask Senna and I'd tell Prost's race engineer and then he'd tell Prost!' In 1989 the relationship broke down and the rivalry reached boiling point. At round two at Imola, Prost was incensed as he believed Senna, who eventually took victory, broke an agreement not to race each other at Tosa corner. The situation was so dire that Ron Dennis held an emergency meeting with the pair at Pembrey Circuit. Worse was to come. At the penultimate round at Suzuka, the team-mates collided at the final chicane in F1's most infamous title decider, something Nichols calls 'inevitable'. Senna needed to win to keep his hopes alive and lunged up the inside. Leader Prost did not back out, the pair collided and the Frenchman retired, trudging back to the pits on foot. Senna got going again with the help of marshals and took the chequered flag first. He was then disqualified for joining the track illegally. Suzuka. More than just a circuit; an arena for some of F1's most timeless, unforgettable moments Surely, none rank higher than the skirmish between team mates Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna, and the crescendo of the 1989 title fight... #F1 #JapaneseGP — Formula 1 (@F1) March 31, 2025 'It was unfortunate, it was nasty, it was kind of what I would have expected from Prost. He's a race-car driver and he doesn't want Senna to overtake, so it's almost inevitable he's going to shut the door,' Nichols says. McLaren unsuccessfully appealed against the penalty, Prost's title was confirmed and Senna called it a 'true manipulation of the championship'. From the McLaren 'family' to Ferrari chaos Nichols moved to Ferrari in 1990, along with Prost. It was like 'leaving home'. 'I know McLaren looked kind of cold and inhospitable, but internally it was fantastic. It was really warm and wonderful on the inside. You'd go to each other's weddings and christenings and barbecues,' he says. 'In '88 I spent that year being Senna's race engineer while he won his first world championship. So leaving that was very difficult. I had a dispute with Ron over a couple of things.' One of those was the organisation of the design of future cars, which was split. Nichols wanted all the engineering 'brainpower' focused on one car. Another, lesser, reason was money. 'Ron wasn't really willing to concede on the organisational thing – one team, all the cars, me in charge, and he wouldn't concede on the money, either. Prost had asked me to go to Ferrari with him and Ferrari were willing to pay 10 times what Ron was, so it was kind of difficult to turn down.' What Nichols faced at Maranello was a world away from Woking. 'I don't know…' Nichols starts. 'Ferrari – just so much confusion and so much chaos and so much politics and so much meddling from the press. 'I'd gone there naively on my own expecting that they'd think: 'OK, he's coming from McLaren, they do almost everything perfectly, he's going to come and show us the way', but they didn't want to change,' he says. Nichols left the Scuderia in 1991, but not before another title-deciding collision between Prost and Senna at Suzuka, this time at turn one. A crash that 'tainted' Senna's title, Nichols believes. 'He didn't need to do that, he could have won the championship without crashing into Prost.' Nichols then had spells at Sauber, Jordan and then a return to McLaren, before his final job at Jaguar in 2002. His latest project is a road car under his own name – the Nichols N1A. The car takes some inspiration from the M1A, the first sports car that was designed and produced by McLaren in the mid-1960s. Fittingly, there is a run of just 15 of the N1A, one for every victory that the MP4/4 took. The name of the car, he admits, is a 'a bit near the knuckle'. Was there any trouble clearing it with his former employers? 'I've had a few discussions and they've been quite understanding. I did spend 14 or 15 years with them and delivered them a lot of success, so I think they're kind of understanding because of that.'
Daily Mail
09-05-2025
- Automotive
- Daily Mail
Last chance to pick up a ticket for this year's four-day Goodwood Festival of Speed in July
It's your last chance to pick up a ticket for this year's four-day Goodwood Festival of Speed in July, which is celebrating 75 years of Formula 1 World Champions with the help of British racing legend Nigel Mansell. Only tickets for Thursday, July 10, remain on sale, though. Get them at Mansell, the 1992 F1 champion, is returning alongside fellow champs Alain Prost and Mario Andretti. Nigel, now 71, said: 'It's been amazing to drive the Goodwood hill-climb in a number of my cars over the years and I can't wait to do it all again!' The Duke of Richmond, above with Mansell, who hosts the festival, said: 'Nigel was more than just a legend of the sport, he was a hero – and celebrating Formula 1 without him would be unthinkable. 'He inspired a level of devotion amongst British fans the like of which we have never seen before or since.'
TimesLIVE
24-04-2025
- Automotive
- TimesLIVE
Alain Prost to return to Goodwood for Festival of Speed
Four-time Formula 1 World Champion Alain Prost will appear at this year's Goodwood Festival of Speed, which is commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Formula 1 World Championship. The 2025 edition of the event will also coincide with two personal milestones for Prost: his 70th birthday and the 40th anniversary of his first world title. To mark the anniversary of his 1985 championship, Prost will drive the McLaren MP4/2B — the car he used to secure that title — on the famous Goodwood Hillclimb. The MP4/2B will also feature on this year's official event poster. Prost, often referred to as 'The Professor' for his calculated racing style, won his F1 titles with McLaren in 1985, 1986 and 1989, and a fourth with Williams in 1993. He retired from the sport with 51 Grand Prix victories, the most in history at the time. Though he didn't win the championship in 1988, Prost actually outscored teammate Ayrton Senna over the season. However, due to rules that only counted a driver's best 11 results from the 16-race calendar, Senna was awarded the title. That season's McLaren-Honda MP4/4 will also be part of this year's Festival, and Prost is set to drive the same chassis in which he won races in Mexico, Monaco, and France. The car is being brought to the event by its current owners, Audrain Motorsport.
