Ayrton and his declarations

The following phrases are taken from various biographies and sites about the champion.
Thanks so much to Davide Righida, the webmaster of www.ayrtondasilva.net, because he has divided them into categories.



Values of life

  • If a person has no more dreams, no longer has any reason to live. Dreaming is necessary, even if in the dream goes glimpsed reality. For me it is one of the principles of life.

  • You can't change the world alone. But you can do your part to change it a bit. What I really do for poverty I'll never say. The F1 is a miserable thing compared to this tragedy.

  • I'm a privileged person, I always had a very good life. But all I got from the life i gained it with the commitment and the strong desire to achieve my goals, to win in life, not as a pilot. So let me tell you that whoever you are in life, whether you are at the lowest or higher level, you must have great strength and great determination and you have to face anything with great love and faith in God, and one day you will reach your goals and you will succeed.

  • I have no idols. I admire the hard work, dedication and competence.

  • Each person has his faith, his way of looking at life. Most of people refuse to talk about topics like these. For me is important to be at peace with ourselves. The way to find this balance is through the faith in God.

  • Rich people can't live on an island surrounded by an ocean of poverty. We all breathe the same air. You have to give everyone a chance.

  • If I did what I did, is because I had a great chance in my life. To grow up in the right way, to live well, enjoy good health, to learn a lot. And I have been helped, at the right times, to go in the right direction.

  • The most important thing is to be yourself, not to let anyone hinder you only because someone wants you to be different. You have to be yourself. Many times you make mistakes because of your personality, your character or interference that you can find along the way. But you can just learn from your mistakes. And this is the main thing: use the mistakes to learn. I believe in the ability of concentrate depply in order to make progress and even more.

  • Life is too short to have enemies.

The relationship with the risk

  • There is a certain amount of danger in motor racing. So any time you go driving, testing or racing, you are exposed to some risks. There are calculated risks and there are unexpected situations that can happen, and you can already be gone away, it’s just in a fraction of a second. So you realise that....suddenly you're nobody. Suddenly you're nobody, and your life can be....can have an end, sudden.......This is your life......Either you face it as a professional, in a detached way, or you just give up, you just leave it and you don't do it anymore, really. I like too much what I do to give up, I can't stop doing it. It's part of my life.

  • No one is immortal, the difference between the pilots and the common people is that we are more at risk. What can you do? We are exposed to risks. You could stop running ... and think you're safe, but then it can happen an accident on the street. I think that is part of life itself. The important thing is to increase the safety as much as possible, not only on the circuits, but also on the cars. Fortunately, I had a very solid car, designed very well, which saved my life. I have no choice. I run at full speed or I don't run at all.

  • I think you can run to 300 Km/h by limiting the risk to a minimum. We should sit at a table with the representatives of the federation with the builders. We must engage men and money and find the best compromise between safety and spectacle. No one has ordered us to race in F1, but we are not paid to die.

  • The cars get faster every day; the circuits remain the same and many are no longer suitable since some years.

  • Remove all electronics was a big mistake, the cars are very fast and hard to drive. It will be a year with many accidents. (Winter test of 1994)

  • There are three or four bumps at the Tamburello corner, and I hope it's been thought to do something ... (San Marino GP 1994)

Competition and Victory

  • Running, compete is in my blood, it's part of me, it's part of my life; it has always been what I do and it comes before everything else.

  • The push to be more competitive is something very exciting for me.

  • It's strange. Just when I think I have gone as far as possible, I realize that I can go even further.

  • I need to do something special. Every year someone wins a title. I want to do more.

  • The important thing is to win everything, always.

  • I want to win, always. The view that the most important thing is to compete is an absurdity.

  • It's the thought to win that pushes me to keep going. This is my greatest motivation; the desire to win is what drives me to compete.

  • I believe that every pilot thinks to be the best and thinks to be able to win all races.

  • We all want to win and there is only one place for victory, only one number one.

  • You think you have a limit, so you try to touch this limit. Something happens, and you can run a bit stronger. Thanks to the power of your mind, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high.

Alain Prost and J.M. Balestre

  • He's humanly incompatible with me, but I can't imagine my career without the stimulus represented by Alain.

  • No one can doubt that Prost is a great driver; his results speak for himself; but there is nothing in common between us.

  • It's clear that I have thought to leave, go home and not come here. I am a professional but I am also a human being, and my values of life are stronger than the desire to destroy them. That's why I am here today, I will run to the maximum, because all of us, all those who contribute, directly or indirectly, to motoring have the responsibilities towards of this universe of fans and the millions of viewers who are watching on television. We must be careful to not be used, avoid publicizing wrong values or misconceptions. Unfortunately, this things happen frequently. (After Suzuka 1989)

  • Sure. That's right. I was not willing to let that guy coming from the curve in front of me. He just had to let me pass. I did not care if we would have collided. I pushed the machine thoroughly, he moved to the inside - and we collided. "Why cause the accident? Because I had been ruined by the system and this happens every time you try to do your job in a transparent and fair way, what i can do? Pull back and say, 'thank you, yes, thank you'? It is clear that it is not possible! (After Suzuka 1990)

  • I dedicate this victory to those who made me lose the World '89 ... The races are done so, sometimes they end up right after the start, sometimes at six laps from the end. (Japan 1990)

Driving style

  • When I ran with the FF1600 I had some trouble driving. Driving with the FF2000 seemed much easier, lighter, and more natural. With the F3 Ralt I felt even better. I think this is very important: I am better as the power increases.

  • Yes, I messed up a certain victory. But to compete is not just be up front in the lead throughout the race and get to the checkered flag. My style is different: I want to take every win for me. This is the real pleasure to race and win. If you do nothing but wait for the mistakes of others, it captures only a fraction of pleasure, and I'm running for the pleasure of winning..

  • Maybe I'm a pilot of attack for being young, but this is not enough. An attacker does exceptional things 1 time on 10. A cool guy, calmer, will get results 4-5 out of 10 times.

  • To compete in the car you must be cold, rational.

  • So far I have done so many pole positions: in comparison to this figure, the fastest laps that I scored in the race are relatively few. This is why I think that not always push hard through out a Grand Prix is the right choice: this is the opposite of what some people think, that is, that I risk too much, constantly.

  • I like street circuits because they force you to drive very clean, constantly with the maximum concentration.

  • When you are under pressure, in a championship or in a race in particular, the one who knows how to combine aggressiveness and calculation will get the best result. You need a clear mind to understand when it's the right time to be aggressive and when to do the calculations. To win a World Cup you have to combine these two elements in the right doses, at the right time.

Past, future and dreams

  • I don't limit myself. I am 33 years old and I think I still have many things to do.

  • I wish that in 1993 there were three Williams, one for me, one for Mansell, one for Prost.

  • I really like to drive and I wish I could do more and to have no other concerns.

  • My biggest wish was always to go faster than everyone, even than the clock did. I think with such a thought, sooner or later all the results will come as a result.

  • I could never once stopped racing, have a future in F1, as have many of my colleagues. I have too many good things on the other side of my life to choose to stay always in F1.

  • The reality is that I learned a lot. It must be so.

  • When I was racing in the minor categories was pure "feeling", it was just a pleasure. Now everything is harder, much harder. There is much less room for fun in what I do.

  • The marriage, children? Calm ... but for sure, at the right time, I will want children too.

Passion and emotion

  • You'll never know how it feels when a driver wins. That helmet hides incomprehensible feelings.

  • Whenever you train or you compete in a Grand Prix, it creates a lot of tension, as there are many responsibilities and risks, that help to create a stressful situation. But you learn to control yourself better, but never to the end.

  • When a person is in a position of strength and enjoys credibility, there's no money that can buy this credibility - we can only win or lose.

  • Up to that my passion for my profession survives, my dream will survive. The day that this passion begin to weaken, my dream will end. Formula One is a world of strong emotions and personality where the weak do not survive.

  • It is not only a world title hunt: a passion is much more extensive. It requires an enormous concentration.

Various

  • It is not a racing driver, is an idiot. (Referred to Irvine, Japan, 1993)

  • If you earn much is because you merit and you're worth much.

  • If i am obsessive, i am so in a positive way. I have a strong natural urge, but it is not harmful is not a problem.

  • It's a little hard to forge a relationship with a person of the opposite sex. Especially if you're young and you make a life that attracts girls.