Roland Ratzenberger

Roland Walter Ratzenberger (4 July 1960 – 30 April 1994) was an Austrian racing driver who raced in various categories of motorsport, including British Formula 3000, Japanese Formula 3000 and Formula One.

Having had sporadic success throughout the lower formulas, Ratzenberger managed to secure an F1 seat in for the new Simtek team, at the unusually late age of 33.

Ratzenberger was born in Salzburg, Austria, on 4 July 1960.

When he was seven, his grandmother took him to a local hillclimb race at Gaisberg.

Ιn 1969, the Salzburgring opened near his home.

As a teenager, he discovered that racer and Formula Ford team owner Walter Lechner was based nearby and, while studying at a technical school, began to hang around the workshop.

On finishing his education at eighteen, he joined Lechner, who was at this time opening a racing school at the Salzburgring.

Ratzenberger began racing in German Formula Ford in 1983, and in 1985 won both the Austrian and Central European Formula Ford championships.

In 1985, he entered the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch in England, finishing second.

He returned in 1986 to win the event, before graduating to British Formula 3 the following season.

While in the UK, he briefly gained fame for the similarity of his name to that of TV puppet Roland Rat, with whom he appeared in an edition of TV-am; the TV-am branding appeared for a time on his car.

He also raced in other cars besides single seaters, once finishing second in the 1987 World Touring Car Championship driving a Team Schnitzer BMW M3.

In 1988, he entered the final few rounds of the British Touring Car Championship in a class B BMW M3, racing for the Demon Tweeks team.

The next year, he entered the British Formula 3000 series, finishing third overall, and also raced in the Le Mans 24 Hours for the first time; the Brun Motorsport, Porsche 962 he shared with Maurizio Sandro Sala and Walter Lechner retired in the third hour.

In the 1990s, Ratzenberger began racing primarily in Japan.

He won one race each in 1990 and 1991 in the Japanese Sports Prototype Championship with the same SARD team he drove for at Le Mans.

He also returned to touring car racing in the Japanese Touring Car Championship, finishing seventh in 1990 and 1991 in a BMW M3.

During the latter year, Ratzenberger tested a CART Lola T91/00 for Dick Simon Racing at Willow Springs.

This paved the way for a return to Formula 3000 in the Japanese championship, with the Stellar team in the 1992 season.

His year began poorly but, when the team upgraded their two-year-old Lola for a new model, Ratzenberger won once to finish seventh overall.

In the winter of 1991, in Monaco, and after what Adam Cooper described as "a whirlwind courtship," Ratzenberger married the former partner of another driver, becoming stepfather to her son from a previous relationship.

He would take part in the next four Le Mans races, with Brun again in 1991, and with the SARD team in 1990, 1992 and 1993.

He came very close to securing a drive with the Jordan team for their inaugural season in 1991.

Negotiations were at a very advanced stage when Ratzenberger lost the financial support of a "major sponsor".

In the end, Bertrand Gachot got the seat.

They were divorced early in 1992.

He remained in the series in 1993, finishing 11th.

That year, he achieved his highest finish at Le Mans, as he, Mauro Martini, and Naoki Nagasaka finished fifth in a Toyota 93 C-V.

Ratzenberger greatly desired to race in Formula One, especially as former rivals in F3000, such as Eddie Irvine and Johnny Herbert, had managed to reach the top level while he had not.

After gaining a sponsor in a wealthy German woman, who negotiated a deal over the 1993-4 winter, Ratzenberger signed a five-race deal with the new Simtek team, partnering David Brabham.

With a very uncompetitive car, Ratzenberger failed to qualify for the first race at Interlagos.

However, the next round at the TI Circuit in Aida went much better, as he not only managed to qualify, but finish in a very commendable eleventh place, even considering that he was the only driver who had raced at the venue before.

The San Marino Grand Prix at Imola would have been Ratzenberger's third race in Formula One.

During the first qualifying session on Friday 29 April, he asked the more experienced Brabham to test his car out; the Australian vindicated Ratzenberger's assessment of the brakes, which had been troubling him at the previous races.

According to Brabham, the issue was soon resolved to the satisfaction of both.

He was killed in a crash during qualifying for the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix just three races into his F1 career.

The weekend became notorious for also seeing the death of Ayrton Senna, a three time world champion, during the race the following day.

The Grand Prix Drivers' Association was reformed as a direct result of Ratzenberger's death, and the weekend as a whole led to a markedly increased emphasis on safety in the sport.

In 1994, he achieved his ambition of becoming one of the few Austrian Formula One drivers.

Two years in British F3 yielded two 12th places in the championship with West Surrey Racing and Madgwick Motorsport.