Ayrton Senna and Adriane Galisteu
In Ayrton Senna’s 34 years on
earth he only ever had three serious women in his life. There were lots of less
serious ones but they were rarely seen in public and never really partners. The
three were his teenage sweetheart and then wife Liliane, between 1975 and 1981;
Xuxa Meneghel, a very famous (and rich) Brazilian TV presenter, between 1988
and 1992; and finally Adriane Galisteu, from 1993 to 1994 – the last and the
most special. Close friends expected them eventually to marry.
It was a love story that started on 15th March 1993, at 4 o’clock, when
Adriane, a 19-year-old Brazilian model went to the offices of the Elite model
agency in São Paulo
The audition almost ended in tears when two Shell executives asked
Adriane to model a swimsuit. She
misunderstood and said she was walking out. She only calmed down when they told
her the uniform for the job had the same cut as a swimsuit, which was why it
was necessary. Three directors of Shell turned out personally at the audition
to approve the girls. The hospitality arrangements at the annual Brazilian
Grand Prix were very important. Big deals would be hatched there and everything
had to be perfect.
Adriane passed the audition
and got the job. She and nine other girls were offered $1,000 each for the
weekend’s work.
Formula One was not entirely strange to Adriane. On a break from a photo-shoot in Portugal in 1990, she
had watched Nigel Mansell win the Portuguese Grand Prix at Estoril.
The proceedings for the Brazilian Grand Prix weekend kicked off on the
Thursday following the audition with a press conference, but Adriane wasn’t
there. She had a modelling job and
refused to break the agreement. To her, the work for Shell was just another
job, albeit hostessing rather than posing for a camera, which she had done
since the age of 12. As she says: “It never crossed my mind that during that
weekend I would find the love of my life.”
Adriane was on her way to becoming a top model in Brazil
By 5am on Friday 19th March, she was out of bed and in a taxi waiting to
take her – still yawning – to the Elite model agency’s offices in the middle of
São Paulo
Friday went, Saturday came and Adriane barely knew why she had even
bothered to go home in-between, so relentless was the pace of the event.
Whispers went around the hospitality suite that Ayrton Senna, having
qualified third for McLaren, would be arriving. Senna was a hero in his homeland and it was well known that he was
single again. He had finally split up with his long-standing girlfriend Xuxa
the year before and there were already rumours that the Shell models had caught
his attention. Even the experienced models got excited and rushed to the
bathroom, crowding around the mirror. Adriane, however, was non-plussed. She
wasn’t a Formula One fan and Senna held the least interest for her. That was
until she saw him.
He arrived in a frenzy, surrounded by fans and photographers. All Adriane could see was his blue cap. She was
immediately impressed with the way he managed to greet everyone personally and
take the whole scene in. He made a short speech and looked over at Adriane.
None of the girls could tell who had caught his eye. She remembers: “I felt he
looked at me. But was it me or Nara who was just behind me? Or was it just an
empty gaze?” By then she was very interested.
Ten Shell guests were allocated to each girl and Adriane visited the pit
garage with her guests. But she didn’t see
Senna. Then, on Sunday, as she was walking through the pitlane with some more
guests, a man called Jacir approached her and said: “I am Ayrton Senna’s
personal assistant. He has asked me to get your phone number.” She gave him her
home number and Elite’s office number. Then Antonio Braga came up and asked her
for her fax number. He hinted at Senna’s interest in her. Braga, who was a
banker and lived in Portugal, was attending the race as Senna’s guest. It was
the start of a lifetime friendship between Adriane and Braga, his wife Luiza
and their daughters, Joanna and Maria.
Jacir, meanwhile, had also asked half-a-dozen other girls for their
phone numbers. Later that day, before the
race, Senna went to the hospitality suite again. Shell was a very important
McLaren sponsor. He made another speech and told the assembled guests: “I can
win.” The girls were all lined up right in front of him in a protective cordon
as he spoke. Adriane got her first close-up look at him. This time his gaze
caught hers and he gave her a smile. She admits that she was hooked on him from
that moment, but was determined not to show it.
In the race, after Alain Prost retired, Senna stormed to victory at his
home Grand Prix. It meant a celebration
party that night at the Limelight Club in the middle of São Paulo. Adriane went
along reluctantly and feigned tiredness, making out she was exhausted after her
hectic three days. In truth she was frightened by what was happening to her.
She says: “As if it was an invented Cinderella story he arrived when the clock
struck 12.”
For some reason she had not expected him to attend, and had dressed down in
jeans and a black top, with a red silk scarf.
She resolved to say hello to Senna and leave. She found him in a padded banquette with his 27-year-old
brother, Leonardo, talking to Brazilian footballer Pelé. The younger Senna was
also popular with women and the table was surrounded by at least a dozen girls,
dressed to the nines, crowding out the three men. As it happened because she
was dressed down and, had made no effort, she stood out. She shook his hand and
said she was just leaving. But Senna pulled her towards him and persuaded her
to stay for a drink. She was scared and retreated to her role as Shell’s
representative. He grabbed her hand as she babbled some PR-speak. Looking back,
it was comical, as Adriane remembers: “I said, ‘You were great. I am here on
behalf of Shell’. He wouldn’t let go of my hand. Only briefly, to get a glass
of champagne which he handed to me.” But Adriane had never drunk alcohol and
asked for a regular Coca-Cola.
From this point accounts of that night vary. Adriane insists she left immediately afterwards whilst
others insist they remember her dancing the night away with Senna. But it
appeared that the eye-witnesses mistook Adriane for another blonde model with
whom Senna did indeed dance the night away.
Adriane says she turned to him and said: “I have to go, you have my
phone number.” She simply wasn’t prepared
to stay and compete with all the other girls. It wasn’t her style. By then she
wanted him quite badly and knew that walking away was a risk. But walk away she
did.
Jacir followed her at Senna’s behest and invited her to a barbecue that
the driver was holding at his beach house in Angra a few days later. It was a going-away party before Senna returned to
Europe for the European season. Adriane didn’t give Jacir an answer and rushed
off home.
Back at home, her mother’s maid woke her early the next day and told her
Ayrton Senna was on the phone. Annoyed,
she went to the phone thinking it was Jacir. She rasped ‘So?’ into the phone,
in the best sarcastic manner she could manage. To her intense surprise, it was
Senna himself, virtually cooing down the phone. She says: “The sweet and calm
voice in which he answered me back was like a cold shower cooling me down.”
He had rung to invite her to his barbecue. Continuing her ‘hard to get’ stance, she was
non-committal and told him she had to rush for an audition. He asked her to
call him when she had finished and gave her his direct phone number.
She admits that she melted from that moment on, and couldn’t resist
calling him back as soon as she got the chance, as it happens, from a call box.
Senna took her call and was very
interested in the TV commercial she had been shooting – and which, ironically,
starred his great track rival Nelson Piquet. Still attempting to play hard to
get, when Senna mentioned the barbecue again, she changed the subject. She
asked him his star sign. “Aries,” he replied. “Me too,” she said.
She told him she was unsure of the barbecue because she didn’t know him.
He replied that everyone knew him. To get
to know him better, he invited her to dinner with his friends at a famous
restaurant called The Place in São Paulo. But later that evening she heard
other girls had been invited and furious she upped the stakes dramatically, and
stood him up. Nevertheless, just in case he called the next day, she packed a
small weekend bag and put it in the boot of her car ready to go to Angra.
Senna had indeed invited one of the other girls from Shell, named
Daniela, to dinner. Daniela was a
blue-eyed blonde from southern Brazil.
The following morning he
dropped her off at the Elite model agency where Adriane was waiting to go on a
job. Inside Daniela referred to Senna as her new boyfriend and left no one in
any doubt as to what had happened the night before.
Adriane was insanely jealous and decided she had probably overplayed her
hand and that she had nothing to lose by calling him. When she did he asked her to Angra again and,
amazingly, she told him she was still thinking about it. She admits now that
she was desperate to say yes.
What happened next was that Adriane found herself in Senna’s 17th-floor
apartment in São Paulo
When they had finished they sat on different sofas, silent and shy. He finally said: “I am pleased to meet you. My name is
Ayrton Senna da Silva. I am 33 years old and I do not have a girlfriend.”
She asked him about Daniela and he pretended he couldn’t remember who
she was. He admitted he had got drunk the
night before.
They talked for an hour-and-a-half. Then
she got her bag from her car in the basement car park and jumped into his black
Honda NSX to go to his offices in the suburb of Santana, where his helicopter
was waiting on the roof. As she had suspected also waiting on the roof were
Daniela and another model who had also worked for Shell at the Grand Prix, plus
Senna’s personal photographer Norio Koike. Senna had hedged his bets and Daniela
was as shocked to see Adriane as Adriane was to see her.
It was Adriane’s first trip in a helicopter and once the girls’ shock of
finding each other on the trip subsided the atmosphere was good as they all
looked forward to a weekend at the sea.
They were greeted at Angra by housekeepers Maria and Matesus, along with
Senna’s dog Quinda. She also found out
that Senna was called ‘Beco’ by his Brazilian friends.
Adriane discovered Angra was a paradise on earth and was Senna’s private
playground. It had a wonderful pool and
was situated directly on the beach. The waves came right up to the bedroom
windows. By day the resort was swamped in sunlight, by night it was bathed in
moonlight.
Senna’s brother Leonardo and his assistant Jacir were also there.
On the first evening, Senna and Adriane danced the night away in his
private discotheque and afterwards he showed her to her own room. They did not even kiss. She says: “I felt that each
minute the temperature between us kept rising. He sat by my side. There was something
special in his smiling tanned face. It was clear he found it very difficult to
take the first step. And I felt, for the first time, the warmth of the
proximity – real and spontaneous. Between us there was something special: a
long talk, a look, a touch. He tried to kiss me. I backed up – not yet.”
Daniela and the other girl were forgotten but it seemed to take forever
for any real intimacy to develop. In the
end, they did kiss. For Adriane, it was immediate love and she felt as though
her world had stopped turning. Then they fell asleep in each other’s arms. She
remembers the details of that first kiss: “Standing, he kissed me. The first
kiss. A real kiss. And then one more, another one, and another one. Kisses,
kisses and more kisses. It seemed like the night had stopped around us –
everything stopped, the night, time, the noises, the sea, the wind. Kisses and
caresses. But nothing more than that.”
The next day brought renewed embarrassment and Adriane kept her
distance. Saturday was a perfect day with
perfect weather and they took his speedboat out. Everything was recorded by
Norio Koike, who clicked his camera seemingly non-stop.
The intimacy problem was eventually solved by the arrival of more
guests, which meant Adriane had to vacate her own room and share. He took her up to his immaculate bedroom and said:
“This is my room. Now it is also yours. Make yourself at home.” She didn’t
demur. It was there that she was first introduced to Senna’s eccentricities. In
his vast wardrobes she counted 40 pairs of tennis trainers and hundreds of
pairs of shoes. There were also endless belts. He appeared obsessed with belts.
He also had enough clothes to change twice a day without washing anything for a
year. And this was just one of his four homes. He said to her: “I am a bit
fanatical about clothes.” She nodded in agreement. She told him she was
obsessed with creams and perfumes. Then he showed her to the bathroom and his
own creams and perfumes, which rivalled hers.
She remembers her feelings that day: “To me sharing his bedroom didn’t
necessarily mean that we’d have sex. I
adored his paradise and I wanted to make sure that I would be coming back there
as a friend or a girlfriend.”
That night she donned what
she called “armoured pyjamas” and they fell asleep. Until he woke her up and
asked if he had to marry her to have sex. Then he started caressing her feet,
her weak point. He told her: “You are the first woman in three years to provoke
desire in me. I don’t feel like kissing your feet, I want to kiss your entire
body.”
It finally happened, and then she fell into blissful sleep. When she woke he was gone. She looked out of the
window and discovered him whistling on the pier, deep in thought. Then in the
middle of that afternoon he took her in his helicopter to Angra airport for the
short flight back to São Paulo. She was scheduled for a fashion show the next
morning. After that, they were inseparable, staying at his apartment in São
Paulo, or the family farm at Tatui, his parents’ home. She would return to Angra
many times over the next 12 months. As the relationship developed he she her if
she would join him at the Monaco Grand Prix. Monaco was very social and he
liked to have a girlfriend with him at the race, especially as he believed he
would win again for the sixth time in 1993 and would need a partner for the
winners ball thrown by Prince Rainier.
So on 17th May Adriane got ready to go to Europe .
It would be the first time she would be
publicly at his side. She was the Shell grid girl transported to be the girlfriend
of the fastest driver alive, at the most glamorous place on earth. On arriving
in the principality, they went straight to Senna’s small Monaco apartment to be
greeted by his Monte Carlo housekeeper Isabel, who was Portuguese. He only
stayed there for a week a year, for the race. He had sold the big apartment he
used when Monaco was his permanent home, before moving to the Algarve in
Portugal two years before. But for tax purposes he listed Monte Carlo as his
home.
Senna walked Adriane around the Monte Carlo
track, introducing her to the intricacies of driving a Formula One car. He also took her to the casino, where they quickly
lost the $300 they had changed into chips.
Adriane had brought three evening gowns to prepare for the annual
post-race ball, where she also sensed her new boyfriend would take the laurels.
After all, he had won Monaco five times
previously and his car was ideally suited to the tight circuit.
She was hampered at the ball by only being able to converse in
Portuguese as her English was very limited. She
was introduced to Betise Assumpção, Senna’s press secretary, who was Brazilian
herself.
Senna hardly let go of her all weekend in Monaco
During practice, when Senna had a small accident and hit the guardrail,
Adriane quickly ran down to the track from the apartment – but it was nothing. On the Sunday she watched the race from the commentary
box of Brazilian broadcaster TV Globo alongside Senna’s friends, Galvao Bueno and
Reginaldo Leme.
When he won, she ran from the box to be with him and cried as the
Brazilian national anthem was played. In
the evening, they dressed up and went to the sporting club to collect his
prize. Few journalists knew who she was and hundreds of picture captions on
Monday morning, in newspapers all over the world, would call her ‘the
mysterious Brazilian blonde’.
The couple sat on the top table at the sporting club. When Adriane turned around she saw she was sat next to
Prince Albert of Monaco on one side, while on her other side were Michael
Douglas, Richard Gere, Cindy Crawford and Princess Caroline. As Adriane ignored
the champagne, Senna joined her in drinking Coca-Cola. Afterwards they went to
Jimmyz’, the most famous nightclub in the world and a symbol of hedonism in
Monte Carlo. As they sat at their table next to the dance floor, Adriane was
astonished by the enormous number of girls who threw themselves at her
boyfriend, some quite brazenly.
When they got home and drifted into sleep, Adriane thought to herself:
“Is it a dream? Is it true?”
After Monaco , they
flew from Nice to London
She remembers now: “Looking back, I realise it was a good combination:
our first trip abroad had been the best trip of all trips. It’s because later things got complicated on the
tracks, problems arose in McLaren, victories became less frequent and tensions
built up.”
Back in Brazil
That summer she accompanied Senna to Europe whenever she could and
stayed at his Algarve
Adriane’s second Grand Prix of 1993 was to be Hungary ,
where they would stay at the new Kempinski Hotel in Budapest
on the banks of the Danube . It was special for her as she had never been and she
had Hungarian ancestry. Her maternal grandparents, Alexander and Agnes, had
migrated from Hungary to Brazil during World War II.
In the evenings they forgot
his troubles and walked by the side of the Danube. They shared the visit with
Senna’s close friends, Christian and Birgit Schues and their two young
children. Adriane stayed in Budapest for much of the time Senna was at the
track.
On race day, Senna retired from the Grand Prix and they were to attend
the post-race party at the Gundel restaurant staged by the race organisers. There, now-famous pictures were taken of them being
serenaded by a violinist. It was another magical evening. Adriane says now: “It
was a photo of two people in love. We were in love.” Hungarian-born publisher,
Andrew Frankl was at the Philip Morris-sponsored party. He was a long-time
friend of Senna’s from his days as publisher of Truck magazine; and had met him
at the Toleman team when it was owned by the eponymous transport company. He
says: “Ayrton was in tremendous form, clearly much in love, holding hands with
Adriane. It was so obvious. I was convinced they would marry.”
In the middle of August, back in Brazil
All summer it was the same pattern, as Senna returned to Brazil
On one occasion, he returned from Belgium
On 3rd September they boarded a flight to stay at his house in the Algarve
Tennis ace Monica Seles was there to cheer her favourite driver, but
Senna retired halfway through and drove straight back to the hotel with not a
word to Adriane. He ordered room service,
choosing for her without asking what she wanted. When crowds began cheering his
name in the car park he snapped out of his bad mood. He said to her: “But I
lost – these Italians are crazy.” She told him: “They’re crazy for you.”
Sensing his mood, she added: “Are you finding it too hard having me around?” He
said: “I promise you that when we leave Italy I will leave the frown behind.”
That night she went to the hotel bathroom and wrote on the mirror in
lipstick:’Good Morning! Smile’.
The next two weeks were spent in the Algarve
He was very moody during that period. The fax machine in the Algarve house whirred continually with draft
contracts and notes from his manager, Julian Jakobi, in England. Adriane
remembers one phone call with Frank Williams in England lasting a staggering
five hours and 40 minutes. He couldn’t sleep until the negotiations were over:
when the document with Frank Williams’ signature on it was faxed through, he
signed it and faxed it straight back.
When they left for Estoril
and the race she packed up ready to fly home immediately after the race without
him. She would next meet him in Tokyo on the Monday after the Japanese race.
The last two Grand Prix events of the year, in Japan and Australia, were a
fortnight apart and they decided to take a holiday in-between, joking it would
be a honeymoon rehearsal. Senna sensed he was in for a change of luck and
indeed he did win both of the last races.
A fortnight later Adriane started the 28-hour flight from Brazil to Japan
and she was picked up at Tokyo
Adriane and Senna flew to Bora Bora in Tahiti for an idyllic week before
the race in Adelaide
But help was at hand as Josef
Leberer restored him to full fitness with some long massages and he was soon
back on top form winning the race.
After two days off in Sydney , they flew
back to São Paulo
Gachot had a serious soft
spot for Senna. When he was jailed for an assault on a London
From Bercy, they flew to
Heathrow and on to the Williams factory in Berkshire for a seat fitting. It was
his first visit there and the staff were sworn to secrecy. His move had not
been declared but Williams wanted to make another splashy announcement for
maximum publicity. Frank Williams greeted them personally. Adriane noted that
the close relationship with Frank Williams was totally different from Senna’s
relationship with McLaren team principal Ron Dennis. He had told her Ron was
‘moody’ which he found increasingly difficult to cope with. He said Frank was a
‘real team manager’, stressing ‘manager’. But he added that although the
relationship between him and Dennis had cooled, he loved the McLaren team to
the extent that he felt it was his real family and that he would return one day
if circumstances were different. In her book Adriane notes that in 1994 she
observed, while standing in the pit garage, that Dennis seemed to take a
perverse pleasure every time Senna retired that year. For certain relations
between them were strained, which Senna told her was a shame after so much
success.
But that was all in the past, as Senna took her hand and toured the
Williams factory, introducing himself and her to the Williams people – his new
home for at least the next three years. His
actions were a clear sign she was a fixture in his life and would be a part of
his new life at Williams.
From Heathrow again, it was
straight back to Brazil, and Christmas with the da Silva family at Tatui. But
Adriane decided at the last minute that she must return to her mother and
80-year-old grandmother, who was very ill, and she left on Christmas Eve. She
borrowed Senna’s mother’s Volkswagen car to drive back to São Paulo.
The official Christmas celebrations with Senna’s parents lasted until
17th January and, in-between, Senna took a quick trip to Europe, testing the
new car and tying up business deals in Germany
During the holiday and that period before the first race, they talked
deeply. He discussed his past girlfriends
with her. She says: “It was done in an atmosphere of passion and confidences.
He talked to me about his past love relationships as if to put them behind
him.”
She says of that time they had together: “I felt I had been given a
present by the gods.” Senna also asked
her about her ex’s. And he spoke of claims that were currently being made in
the Brazilian press about an illegitimate daughter called Vitoria, who he was
supposed to have fathered by a girl called Marcella Praddo. Senna admitted he
had spent the previous New Year’s Eve with Marcella but that the baby could not
possibly be his. (Later proved by DNA tests after he died). They spoke as the
waves lapped their bedroom windows. The idyll was only disturbed when Senna had
an accident on his jet-ski, and almost stopped breathing after he hit the water
very badly. But it was only a momentary panic. Resuscitated, he recovered by
laying perfectly still for a week.
Senna went to Europe again,
for a pre-arranged testing and visit to Germany, at the beginning of March and
returned to Brazil on the 11th. They then went back to Angra. The sojourn was
only interrupted by the return to São Paulo for the Brazilian Grand Prix, the
biggest sporting event of the year in Brazil.
But shortly after the dreamy days at Angra, a problem arose that
threatened the very existence of the relationship. Adriane was becoming famous as Senna’s girlfriend and
he warned her about being exploited by the media for that fame. From being a
mystery blonde, in Brazil she was already a celebrity in her own right. She
didn’t see trouble coming and his words of warning fell on deaf, 20-year-old
ears.
She received the chance of a big photo-shoot with a Brazilian weekly
magazine called Caras, the Brazilian equivalent of Hello! magazine. It was a swimwear shoot on Camburi beach. Adriane
asked Senna’s permission and, when he realised the photographer would be Fabio
Cabral, he agreed she should do it.
Senna initially approved of
the individual photos he was shown on 21st March, as he and Adriane celebrated
his 34th birthday, before the magazine was published. She also showed them to
his mother, who thought they were beautiful. But when the magazine was
published, two days later, the photos had been arranged in a provocative
fashion over a 12-page feature and on the cover. Senna thought it was cheap,
and exploited their relationship. It didn’t help that the magazine was
published in the same week as the Brazilian Grand Prix. The magazine’s editor
believed he was introducing properly the beautiful girlfriend of the national
hero. Senna thought differently and was incensed. As Adriane looked at the
magazine, she remembers her inner thoughts: “I felt a shiver down my spine. The
article was beautiful. The text was perfect. But I kept asking myself, should I
have done it?”
That night in the Rua Paraguai apartment, Senna exploded: “You look like
this, I think a commoner. How could you
let them do this?” He threw the magazine against the wall of the apartment he
shared with his brother.
Adriane remembers: “I didn’t
move. Any argument would have been in vain. Dozens of times I had seen him like
that, but never as a victim. I never thought it would be me.”
She told him she was a model. That
was what she did and she needed the work and the money. He shot back: “You must
understand that you are not the same person any more, Adriane. Now you are my
girlfriend. You don’t have to show the world you have a beautiful body, this
other side of Adriane Galisteu.” She knew she was in real trouble as he had
never called her Adriane before. He had always known her as ‘Dri’. She said: “I
am not forcing you to understand, I am very happy about my choices.”
She remembers it as if it was yesterday: “I wanted to cry, but I tried
not to. I proposed the end of our
relationship, but my heart was the size of a pea and cried ‘no, no’. Suddenly,
I noticed tears were rolling down his face. I understood that he was telling me
‘Yes, it’s over, goodbye…’ I told him: ‘We have had a wonderful time. We’ve
never had a fight like this. I’m really shocked with what happened here today.
You showed me an Ayrton that I couldn’t recognise’.”
When she asked him what he specifically didn’t like, he said: “All this
shit, especially the photos.” She
admitted to him she had been wrong, and apologised. All that night the argument
continued. In the morning, he said to her: “I never doubted your character, I
only said I didn’t like what happened.” As they parted, he admitted he was also
jealous, a trait not usually part of his character, as he said: “You should
show your beautiful body only to me.” She shot back: “I am jealous myself.” He
asked her to buy the copyright of the photos from the magazine so he could keep
them himself.
He later admitted he had been
irritated by the photographer’s ‘boldness’. He said: “I am experienced by the
banana skins people place in the way of famous and respected people. But you
are just a girl and you must be careful not to hurt yourself.”
The Brazilian Grand Prix came and went. Senna got pole position, but retired after a spin, and his new great
rival, Michael Schumacher, won. The following Tuesday he had hired an aircraft
hangar in which he would announce to the Brazilian motor trade that he was
introducing the German Audi range of cars into Brazil. It was the culmination
of his winter trips to Germany.
For the evening reception, Adriane accompanied him dressed to the nines.
Senna announced he would also have deals
with Ducati motorcycles and Mont Blanc pens for Brazil. These would be the
first of many products he would import to Brazil for his new business life,
when he planned to effect a seamless change from top racing driver to top
businessman. He had seen the demoralising effect of retirement on drivers and
he did not intend that to happen to him.
Afterwards Adriane had the uncomfortable job of apologising to Milton
and Neyde da Silva for the Caras photos. They
were also upset. But after a heart-to-heart discussion, she thought they had
put it behind them.
However, there were other matters rankling the family, matters that were
not discussed. Over the winter weeks at
Angra, Senna and Adriane had hatched a plan whereby she would join him in
Portugal at his Algarve house for the whole of the European Grand Prix season
and they would stay there permanently for five months, and not return to
Brazil. His usual style had been to return home after every other race for a
week. It bothered the family immensely, but they could say nothing, and do
nothing. It created an unseen rift between them and Adriane and that would
erupt in the week before the San Marino Grand Prix culminating in Leonardo
being sent to Europe to persuade him to give Adriane up.
Senna’s decision not to come home for five months was received very
badly by the family and was squarely blamed on Adriane’s influence and it
particularly upset his sister, Viviane, and brother, Leonardo. In truth, it had been Senna’s decision and Adriane had
gone along with it as his wish. He wanted an uninterrupted summer with her in
the Algarve. The family were having to learn the lesson that their famous son
was at last ready to flee the nest and settle down with the love of his life.
They didn’t take it well. But Adriane knew none of this at the time.
On 3rd April 1994, Adriane saw Senna for the last time. He was going to Japan and she was staying on for a
month in São Paulo to take an intensive English language course. If she was to
settle in Europe for half the year, she would have to be able to speak English.
She drove Senna to the airport in her silver Fiat Uno for his flight. He would not return to Brazil until the end of
September. She would leave Brazil four weeks later and move into his house in
Portugal and they would live together. It was clearly the prelude for something
big. She felt he had nearly proposed several times and she expected to come
back to Brazil as his fiancée.
Adriane says now of 3rd April: “It was a very special day and I didn’t
know why at the time. Before he went we
had a long afternoon of love. We got to the airport early and we stayed in the
car and talked, hugged and kissed. He said to me ‘I’ll keep an eye on you
little girl’. He said goodbye, and gave me a long kiss in the car.” She recalls
his words the last time they were at Angra together: “One day I will marry you
and one day I will work for Ferrari. I will end my career there and end my life
with you.”
He told her he planned to
leave Williams two years hence, when he believed the team would peak, and move
to Ferrari, which he believed would then have its act together after the return
of Luca di Montezemolo as boss. He told her: “Even if the Ferrari is as slow as
a Volkswagen Beetle, I still want to be driving it on my last start, my last
lap, my last race. Ferrari is the myth of Formula One. The tradition, the soul,
the passion.”
And that was it. She would
never see him again. She threw herself full-time into the English course, which
occupied all her time – as well as packing for five months away. Senna went to
Japan but retired from the Pacific Grand Prix as his rival for the
championship, Michael Schumacher, won again. He later told Adriane, as he told
everyone close to him, that he thought Schumacher’s Benetton was running banned
electronic aids from time to time. Time differences and a heavy sponsor
commitment meant he missed speaking to her on her birthday and did not get
through until 6am the following day, desperately apologising for waking her so
early. She understood the pressures on him in Brazil, as she had witnessed them
herself the previous year. By 21st April, Senna was back at the Algarve house.
She was cramming English lessons into the evenings as well. Later that day, she
faxed him her first love-letter in English. She carried on with the
lessons right up to her Varig flight to Lisbon
SOURCE
RUBYTHON, Tom. The Life of Senna. 1st Edition Sofback. London
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