Senna had a magnetic charisma married to a formidable intellect, a poetic eloquence in several languages and a rare willingness to confront and discuss the risks of his chosen profession. Even the most jaded members of the Formula One fraternity were mesmerized by his passionate soliloquies and in his press conferences you could hear a pin drop as Senna spoke with almost hypnotic effect. His command performances were captured by the media and the new technology, as was the case in qualifying for the 1988 Monaco Grand Prix where, watched by an in-board cockpit camera, he became a passenger on a surreal ride into the unknown. Already on pole, Senna went faster and faster and was eventually more than two seconds quicker than Prost in an identical McLaren. “Suddenly, it frightened me,” Ayrton said, “because I realized I was in a different dimmension, well beyond my conscious understanding.” Beyond his driving genius Senna was one of the sport’s most compelling personalities. All this came together in a man who changed the face of his sport — for the worse, by expanded forever what was acceptable in terms of on-track behavior, and for the better by taking F1 to an entirely new audience.

Over the last years of his life, Senna seemed to mellow a bit, becoming almost philosophical about the relationship between Grand Prix racing and personal growth. Many who had despised him when he was younger had, with the passage of time, come to understand that Senna’s brilliance as a driver was matched by a depth of character and compassion uncommon among the elite of F1. Senna’s last race was the 1994 San Marino GP, where he crashed violently and perished — after taking his final pole — while leading the race on lap seven. Senna’s untimely death (one of only two in F1 since the late 1970s) left Formula One without its shining star and ushered in a renewed concern for safety.

Senna’s unexpected and inexplicable death came with millions watching live on television as he drove the finest car in F1 towards a highly anticipated win in yet another Grand Prix. It came at a time when he was close to being crowned prince of racing, and made a myth of the only driver capable of living his own legend. Among the several drivers carrying Senna’s coffin to the grave in São Paulo was Alain Prost. Among the mourners was Frank Williams, who said simply, “Ayrton was no ordinary person. He was actually a greater man out of the car than in it.” A highly religious man, Senna ironically had a premonition on the evening before the race that he would be killed. It was later revealed that a furled Austrian flag was found in his car — a flag Senna had intended to raise in honor of Roland Ratzenberger, who was killed in qualfying on the Saturday of that black weekend, after the race. This painting is based on his final win at the Australian GP in 1993.