Lawrence Barretto is today one of the most prominent faces in the paddock, owing to his excellent job as a presenter, broadcaster, and writer.
And even for the Briton, like many other professionals in F1, there was a turning point in his life that dictated his path to the sport.
Barretto was always fascinated to work in the sporting industry, and he credits that to his family’s inclination towards sports.
That said, the 1994 Australian GP was the moment he knew that the sport he wanted to someday join was Formula 1.
Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill collide in Adelaide. Separated by a point, Schumacher wins his first world championship
Australia – 1994#F1 pic.twitter.com/SBvwfioUwv
— F1 History (@TodayF1History) March 20, 2024
“I remember watching the ’94 Australian GP. [Micheal] Schumacher and [Damon] Hill collided and I was just fascinated by the politics of it all, the racing elements. I loved it and I kind of got hooked on the sport from there on,” he revealed on the DrivenByUs podcast.
The 1994 season will be remembered in the annals of F1 history for many years, mainly due to the tragic deaths of Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger at the San Marino GP, but also because of the title decider in Adelaide.
Naturally, it was that race with Schumacher and Hill’s incident that propelled Barretto into making a career in the paddock.
How did the 1994 Australian GP unfold?
The Australian GP was the season-finale held at the Adelaide Street Circuit. Schumacher was leading the championship by a slim margin of one point. Hill, who was driving for Williams at that time, needed to finish ahead of the German driver to bag his maiden title.
That opportunity seemingly presented itself when Schumacher made a mistake and went off track. Hill smelled blood and went to make a move on the inside of the recovering Benetton. But Schumacher sharply cut the British driver off, sending himself catapulting into the barriers and leaving Hill with a broken suspension arm.
This meant that neither of the drivers finished the race and Schumacher won the championship by a single point. This created a furor in the paddock with many alleging that Schumacher crashed himself and Hill out on purpose.
The German racing driver would attempt a similar move — this time with a Ferrari — at the 1997 title decider in Jerez. This time around, it would be Jacques Villeneuve’s Williams that he would drive into at Jerez.
But the racing gods weren’t having any of it as it was the German who retired from the race. Villeneuve took the chequered flag and won his one and only F1 world title, becoming the last ever Williams driver to win the ultimate prize.
