Ayrton Senna’s first win was a borderline cinematic effort on a rainy Sunday afternoon at the 1985 Portuguese Grand Prix, he was driving the Lotus 97T and the win would be Lotus’s first since the untimely death of Colin Chapman in 1982.
Senna’s long list of wins began with the car you see pictured here, this is chassis #2 and it’s owned by Classic Team Lotus – a company run by Colin Chapman’s son Clive. The car now makes regular appearances at motorsport events around Britain and was recently displayed at The Goodwood Festival of Speed and the Renault World Series, driven by Martin Donnelly.
I’ve added the start of the 1985 Portuguese Grand Prix below for those who haven’t seen it (or those who’d like to see it again). If you click through to YouTube you can actually watch the entire race – it’s divided into 13 parts.
Ben Branch has had his work featured on CNN, Popular Mechanics, the official Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with millions of readers around the world and hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
The Legacy Overland 1985 Toyota Land Cruiser BJ40 The BJ40 you see here has been comprehensively restored by Legacy Overland to better-than-original condition. Every part has been either reconditioned or replaced, and the body, chassis, engine has been comprehensively restored, using new parts and paint that’ll far outlast their original counterparts. Legacy Overland are headquartered…
The Baldwin Motion Corvette The Baldwin Motion Corvette is the result of a collaboration between Motion Performance and Baldwin Chevrolet on Long Island, they were only built between 1969 and 1971, before the US Justice Department shut them down. The Feds used the Clean Air Act of 1970 to launch their case, The U.S. Government…
The Triumph Thruxton 1200 R is the top of the line model in the new generation of modern classic motorcycles built by the venerable British marque, and this one is a little more special than most – it was built by the team at Untitled Motorcycles for GQ and Barbour as part of the GQ…
The Orkney Baffle by Ashley Watson was developed to seal the otherwise exposed area between the bottom of your motorcycle helmet and the collar of your jacket.
The Lamborghini LM002 was quickly dubbed the “Rambo Lambo” when it was unveiled to the public in 1986. Although very few realized it at the time, the LM002 wasn’t just an ostentatious flash in the pan. Luxury SUVs would quickly become one of the fastest growing sectors in the global automotive marketplace – and Lamborghini…
The MV Agusta three-cylinder, known as the Tre Cilindri, was ridden by Giacomo Agostini to 13 of his 15 World Championship titles between 1966 and 1973. MV Agusta had started with a 350cc version of the three-cylinder in 1965, this engine would be expanded to 500cc for 1966, allowing the Italian company to challenge both the 350cc…
