Latest news with #JulesBianchi
Time of India
5 days ago
- Automotive
- Time of India
Ten years on, Charles Leclerc honors Jules Bianchi: 'I have that competitiveness in me because of him'
It's been ten years since Formula 1 driver Jules Bianchi's passing in 2015. He began his Formula 1 journey as a test driver for Ferrari and had just started his career as a main driver for Marussia when he lost his life following a race accident at the Suzuka Circuit one year later. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now His godson and close friend Charles Leclerc has paid him a touching tribute on his 10th death anniversary, calling him the most competitive person he has ever met. Remembering Jules Bianchi on his 10th death anniversary Footage of Jules Bianchi's racing days was shared by Formula 1's official social media, with Charles Leclerc providing the voiceover. He spoke about how Bianchi gave his absolute maximum in everything he did but never had a car that could fully showcase his talent. Reacting to the video, a fan wrote, 'I truly can't believe it's been 10 years. He would have been a champion by now for sure. It's odd to think how different F1 would be now if he were still here. #JB17 always missed.' Another said, 'Hearing these heartfelt words from Charles makes me cry — he's surely following Jules' dream.' Pointing out the absence of the Halo safety device before 2018, a fan wrote, 'If only they had invented Halo a few years earlier…' Jules Bianchi's tragic accident during Japanese Grand Prix The Halo was introduced and made compulsory only after accidents like that of Jules Bianchi, who lost his life at just 25 years old during the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix at the Suzuka Circuit. He lost control of his car while yellow flags were out and a damaged car was being removed by a crane and a wheel loader. He ended up crashing at the site. The race took place in poor weather conditions, as a typhoon had hit Tokyo. Charles Leclerc recalls his childhood days with Jules Bianchi Charles Leclerc also penned a tribute for in which he revealed, 'I looked up to him, so to be racing with him, with my older brother, with his younger brother, and many, many other professional karting drivers at the time was incredible.' Tired of too many ads? go ad free now 'We had so much fun. We would hang out and wait for the karting track to close to the public so we could get on. Then we'd go crazy on track for hours and hours. These are probably the most special memories I have. Jules was the most competitive person I've ever met, and I feel like I have that competitiveness in me because of Jules,' he added. Also Read: Charles Leclerc currently drives for Ferrari and has shared some of his best childhood memories with Bianchi. Many other racing drivers also shared posts on social media in his memory.
The Independent
5 days ago
- Automotive
- The Independent
A tribute to Jules Bianchi, 10 years on from F1 driver's passing
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.'
New York Times
5 days ago
- Automotive
- New York Times
Ten years on from Jules Bianchi's death: Charles Leclerc remembers his friend and F1 mentor
Ten years and nine months ago, Formula One changed forever. Typhoon Phanfone had swept across Japan, soaking the Suzuka Circuit. Despite speculation that it would be abandoned, the Japanese Grand Prix went ahead. As the race's finale approached, Sauber's Adrian Sutil aquaplaned and spun into the tire barriers, triggering double yellow flags to warn drivers about the accident. Advertisement The cars continued navigating the circuit as marshals and a recovery vehicle entered the track. A lap later, disaster struck. Jules Bianchi lost his Marussia car in a similar way to Sutil at the same corner. He collided with the recovery vehicle at 78 miles per hour. Bianchi was taken to the Mie General Hospital and underwent surgery after a CT scan showed he had suffered a severe head injury. He never regained consciousness and died nine months later, on July 17, 2015 — 10 years ago today. He was 25 years old. Bianchi was the first driver to die from injuries sustained on an F1 race weekend since Ayrton Senna at Imola in 1994. His death led to significant motorsport safety changes, including the halo cockpit safety device and the virtual safety car system. The promising Frenchman had given Marussia its first-ever points finish at the 2014 Monaco Grand Prix, and Bianchi was closely tied to Ferrari. Its former chairman, Luca di Montezemolo, told Sky Sports Italia in 2015 that Bianchi 'was a member of the Ferrari family and was the driver we had picked for the future — once the collaboration with (Kimi) Räikkönen was over.' But Bianchi was bigger than his on-track accomplishments. To Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc, Bianchi was not just a close family friend. He was also his motorsport mentor and inspiration. Today, Leclerc is living the life Bianchi might've had and perhaps could even have enjoyed together. 'Jules was a very important person for me,' Leclerc told The Athletic. 'Not really for what he achieved on track — even though it was very inspiring to see that — but for the person he was. He had a huge influence on my career. Without him, I wouldn't be where I am today.' Sitting inside Ferrari's hospitality unit at the Miami Grand Prix in May, there was a buzz in the air. People darted in and out of the makeshift buildings arranged around the Hard Rock Stadium's field for media day, but it didn't seem to faze Leclerc as he told stories about himself and Bianchi, a faraway look in his eye and smiles flashing across his face. Advertisement They had known each other since childhood, first crossing paths when Leclerc was four years old. There was an eight-year gap between the two, but they bonded over karting at the Brignoles track owned and managed by Bianchi's father, Philippe, who was friends with Leclerc's father, Hervé, who died in 2017. 'I've always said that the Bianchi and the Leclerc family was one — we were really always together,' Charles said. 'Every weekend, I was at his track. When he was doing his first Monaco Grand Prix, he would sleep at my apartment. We had a very special relationship.' Leclerc started racing against Bianchi a couple of years after their first meeting, and while 'it was only fun' for his older friend — already winning trophies as a junior karter — Leclerc faced a steep learning curve given the difference in their levels. Leclerc said, 'I always tried to analyze what he was doing and I thought that this gave me an advantage compared to kids that were racing against me, that maybe didn't have these kinds of fights with people that were older and such talented drivers like Jules.' Throughout his karting journey, Bianchi collected notable achievements. He finished third in the Trophée des Jeunes FFSA Cadets in 2002 and won the 2005 Asia-Pacific Championship Formula A title. Two years later, Bianchi advanced to racing cars, securing five wins and finishing first in his debut French Formula Renault 2.0 season. As the Frenchman climbed the international racing ranks, Leclerc watched on, learning what he could. 'Even in the most stupid, irrelevant little things that he did,' Leclerc said. 'I was looking up at him — from the way he was cleaning his kart to the way he drove,' he continued. 'And so you try and reproduce all the good things from what you see. You experience the things that you see to find out if they work for you. All the very little things. Just by being himself, I learned a lot.' One of the driving characteristics that Leclerc picked up from Bianchi as a kid was his braking style. In F1, Leclerc is known for being aggressive on the brakes, hitting the pedal quite late and overlapping with throttle usage when entering corners. Not only does his braking style help car rotation in corners, but if he gets it right, it means higher entry speeds and faster lap times, too. It can be challenging, as brakes can easily lock and Leclerc hates cars that understeer — where the front wheels don't turn as fast as a driver wants. 'I'm never totally off brake,' Leclerc said. 'I remember this being one of Jules' first lessons. I remember being a kid and focusing on that. Now, it's completely natural. Jules had a big influence.' Some of the fondest memories Leclerc holds onto about Bianchi come from the karting track. 'We were doing a lot of stupid things,' he recalled, such as going around the circuit the opposite way to its layout. Their parents filmed the second time Leclerc went karting at Brignoles. He remembered how Bianchi selected a kart 'that was too small for him, just to race against me.' In the background of the unreleased footage, their parents discussed 'how incredible it would be to see both of us in Formula One.' Advertisement 'When you see this footage, you can understand how far away you are from Formula One and this crazy world,' Leclerc continued. 'So everything seemed very unlikely, even for one of us to get there, let alone the fact that we both made it.' Bianchi joined the Ferrari Driver Academy in 2009 and became the team's test driver two years later. The following season, in 2012, he served as Force India's reserve driver and then made his F1 debut at the 2013 Australian Grand Prix as a full-time driver with Marussia. Racing for a backmarker team, Bianchi didn't score any points in that campaign, but retained his seat. At the 2014 Monaco GP, he scored his and Marussia's first and only F1 points, finishing ninth. His accident at Suzuka occurred nine races later. 'It's a very special sport, because you can be the most talented driver ever, but if you don't find yourself at the right time, at the right place, you can also end up not having any wins,' Leclerc said. 'Not for your own fault, but just because it was just not meant to be. And this is what's sad about the sport in general. In some cases, and especially in Jules' case, he definitely had the talent to become a Formula One world champion.' They may never have raced in F1 together, but Leclerc is competing at the pinnacle of motorsport, in part, thanks to Bianchi. At the end of 2010, Leclerc's family were struggling to afford his karting, jeopardizing his racing future. Bianchi spoke to his manager Nicolas Todt — son of former Ferrari team principal and FIA president Jean Todt — about Leclerc's situation and Todt agreed to financially support him. He manages Leclerc to this day, and like Bianchi, Leclerc has long been tied to Ferrari's driver development program. That investment helped Leclerc chase his dream, and he has been racing in F1 for eight years, seven with Ferrari. Bianchi's memory lives on through Leclerc and karting. During the fall, there's a 42-hour karting marathon held at Circuit Paul Ricard in France, which is close to Brignoles. It's now known as the Jules Bianchi Marathon Karting. Advertisement Leclerc and Bianchi competed in the event together, seven times total, and one memory of when Bianchi was 18 particularly sticks with Leclerc. At 1 a.m. one year, Bianchi and the team left Leclerc in the kart, driving for several hours straight, while 'they all went to the club,' Leclerc said. They returned by five or six in the morning, Leclerc said, 'and I was so tired, but I didn't want to stop in the pits, because I didn't want to lose the race.' When Bianchi died in July 2015, the karting marathon was paused until a few years ago. Leclerc kept speaking with Philippe about restarting the event to raise money for the Jules Bianchi Association, which supports Hôpital L'Archet (where Bianchi was treated after he'd been transferred home to Nice from Japan). The 42-hour, 19-minute and 50-second marathon returned in 2023, and Leclerc's team won last year, fighting with another team until the last hour for the victory. This year's event will mark the 10th edition and will be held from September 12-14. 'It brings back very good memories from the past, and I also get to see people that I haven't for a long time, but it's great fun,' Leclerc told The Athletic in 2024. 'I did it with my best friends, who are not at all racing drivers. But we still managed to win.' What a team 😘🏆42 hours of flat out racing, that was fun!!Good to be raising money for the Jules Bianchi association ❤️ — Charles Leclerc (@Charles_Leclerc) September 9, 2024 Bianchi's memory also lives on each time F1 hits the track. Since 2018, every car has been fitted with the halo device — credited with saving many lives in crashes since, but it had been under consideration since the late 2000s. Every race, officials can activate the virtual safety car system, which, since 2015, has electronically ordered drivers to slow their speed in dangerous moments. It was developed specifically due to Bianchi's crash, with yellow flag warnings alone deemed insufficient in the aftermath. Every time Leclerc drives onto the track, Bianchi is with him. Etched on the back of his race helmet are two names and dates: PaPa and Jules. 'Unfortunately, we never got to race together in F1 for the reasons we know. But we both realized our dream of becoming F1 drivers. And, for me, I'm sure that he's proud.'
