The
1993 Australian Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Adelaide
on November 7, 1993. It was the final round
of the
1993 Formula One
season.
Ayrton Senna finished his six-year
spell with McLaren (before joining
Williams for 1994) by taking his only pole
position of the season, and his fifth victory of the year. It was
the last race that Senna won. This was the last race for cars with
active suspension, which was
banned from the
1994 season.
Having taken a
Lotus to victory in the
1987 Monaco Grand Prix, Senna
was the first and the last driver to win a race driving an active
suspension car.
It was the last race for four-time champion
Alain Prost. Senna was so overcome with emotion,
knowing his great rival was retiring, that he embraced Prost on top
of the rostrum. (Prost's contract with Williams initially included
a clause forbidding Senna from joining the team but it expired for
the upcoming 1994 season, so Prost opted to retire rather than
partner Senna.)
Riccardo Patrese
also retired from Formula One after this event, having competed in
256 Grands Prix; a record that was only broken fifteen years later,
by
Rubens Barrichello.
This race marked the end of
Canon's
sponsorship of the Williams team, and
Camel sponsorship of the Benetton
team.
The last race of the season was in Adelaide and Senna prevented the
Williams team from a clean sweep of poles by taking pole ahead of
Prost, Hill, Schumacher, Häkkinen and Berger. At the start, the top
4 stayed the same while Berger got ahead of Häkkinen.
While Senna pulled out a small lead, the two Williamses and
Schumacher stayed together. Schumacher passed Hill on lap 8 and
attacked Prost. He pitted early on lap 15 and rejoined in fourth
but his engine failed on lap 20. During the stops, Häkkinen was
slow and Alesi and Brundle got ahead of him. His engine failed on
lap 29.
During the second round of stops, Senna kept his 10 second lead
while Alesi got ahead of Berger and Patrese got ahead of Brundle.
On lap 61, Hill tried to catch Prost by surprise to take second. As
Prost moved over to block, Hill had to back off and he spun, losing
time but no places. Patrese was set to finish sixth in his 256th
and last race but his fuel pressure dropped on the last lap. Senna
won with Prost finishing his last race in second ahead of Hill,
Alesi, Berger and Brundle.
At the end of the season, Prost finished off his career with the
World Championship with 99 points with arch-rival Senna second with
73, Hill third with 69, Schumacher fourth with 52, Patrese fifth
with 20, Alesi sixth with 16, Brundle seventh with 13 and Berger
eighth with 12. In the Constructors' Championship, Williams were
dominant World Champions with 168 points, double the tally of
second-placed McLaren who got 84 and just beat Benetton with 72
into third. Ferrari were fourth with 28 - better than 1992, but
still a disappointing season by their high standards.
With Prost not defending his title, the Williams cars would once
again bear numbers 0 and 2 for 1994.
Classification
Notes
team until
the 1997 Luxembourg Grand
Prix.
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