The 1990 F1 season will always be remembered for that infamous round 15 in Japan where Ayrton Senna employed some, shall we say, ‘robust’ tactics at the first corner which settled the title in his favour. However, Alain Prost gave the Brazilian an almighty scrap that year, having jumped ship from McLaren to Ferrari.
Here we see Prost presumably qualifying for round 14 at Jerez in the Ferrari 641 and believe me you’ll want the volume cranked right up for this one. The V12 in the back of the Ferrari screams and wails in such a way that you’d never believe it could sustain two hours of this kind of punishment. But survive it did. Despite bagging pole position Ayrton Senna was eventually passed by the Ferraris of Prost and Mansell for a 1-2 finish.
In an F1 car Jerez is a tight track. The driver never seems to get much chance to ‘relax’ in between corners and here the camera angle illustrates that beautifully. It’s bumpy, too. Prost’s performance here is a blend of smoothness and aggression and this is one of those clips where you get a really good sense of the tremendous aerodynamic forces at work.
Bear in mind that the Ferrari 641 is considered (rightly, in my opinion) to be one of the best-looking winged F1 cars, and what Prost is doing with it here seems all the more special.
And that noise …
&width=75)
&width=75)
&width=75)
&width=75)
&width=75&fastscale=false)
&width=75)
&width=75)
&width=75)