Roland
Ratzenberger

Roland Ratzenberger was born in Salzburg on 4 July 1960. After technical school he joined Walter Lechner at the age of 18, just as Lechner was opening a racing school at the Salzburgring. He began racing in German Formula Ford in 1983. In 1985 he won the Austrian and Central European Formula Ford championships, and in 1986 he won the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch. He then moved up to British Formula 3 and also contested the 1987 World Touring Car Championship for Schnitzer in a BMW M3. In 1989 he finished third in British Formula 3000 and made his first start in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

During the 1990s he raced mainly in Japan, in sports car and touring car series as well as Japanese Formula 3000. In the 1992 season of that championship he won a race and finished seventh overall. In 1993 he took the C2 class win at Le Mans with SARD in a Toyota 93C-V, finishing fifth overall, his best placing in the event.

He reached Formula One in 1994 with the new Simtek team. He failed to qualify for the opening round in Brazil. At the Pacific Grand Prix in Aida he started 26th and finished 11th, which remained his only start. He died on 30 April 1994 after an accident in qualifying for the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola. Ayrton Senna died there the following day. Both deaths led to wide-ranging safety reforms and to the re-establishment of the Grand Prix Drivers' Association. At the next race in Monaco, the first two grid slots were left empty and painted with the Austrian and Brazilian flags in tribute to Ratzenberger and Senna.

Source: Wikipedia, “Roland Ratzenberger”. Text licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.