22/03/2016
NEWS STORY
As FIA president, over the years Max Mosley received more than his fair share of criticism, some of it justified, much of it not.
In the wake of the spring afternoon which witnessed the deaths of Roland Ratzenberger and Ayrton Senna, the first fatality during an F1 race since Canada twelve years earlier (Riccardo Paletti), Mosley set about bringing the safety aspect of the sport into the twentieth century.
Whilst many claimed his reaction was knee-jerk and the sport was being emasculated, countless drivers since then have had cause to thank him for his crusade.
Reflecting on another horrific crash, unquestionably unsurvivable in previous eras, Mosley admits the satisfaction of seeing Fernando Alonso walk was worth the criticism and hard work.
"You wouldn't know for sure without a detailed analysis but generally speaking those sorts of accidents resulted in serious injury or death,” he told the Press Association.
"Happily that seems to have stopped," he continued. "There are still freak accidents, like Jules, but those sort of serious racing accidents, you do expect the driver to walk away. That wouldn't have been the case 20 years ago.
"This was thanks to Sid Watkins and a team of really competent people and the teams themselves. It needed to be looked at scientifically and that was the big change after Ayrton Senna's death at Imola in 1994.
"It's very satisfying to see Alonso walk away. You work hard and it's very satisfying when you see the results. It was quite an impressive crash."