Ron Dennis opens up on what made Ayrton Senna “phenomenal”

In the build-up to the 25th anniversary of Ayrton Senna's death, we're paying tribute to his achievements and reassessing his career with new articles and classic material from the Autosport archive.

Jonathan Noble Apr 27, 2019, 9:13 AM

Upd: Apr 27, 2019, 9:15 AM

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Ron Dennis and Ayrton Senna's Formula 1 careers became irrevocably entwined as the legendary Brazilian won his three titles with McLaren. Five years ago, as Formula 1 marked 20 years without Senna, Jonathan Noble heard Ron's personal stories of working with the man who defined his time at the head of McLaren more than anyone else…

There are few people, if any at all, better qualified to talk about Ayrton Senna the racing driver than Ron Dennis, his boss at McLaren. It's Dennis's voice that perhaps carries the greatest resonance at moments like this. His and Senna's relationship was not just a successful sporting partnership – it went much deeper than that.

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Author Jonathan Noble

Jonathan Noble is Motorsport.com’s Formula 1 editor. Having graduated from University of Sussex Jonathan worked for sports news agency Collings Sports reporting on F1, F3, touring cars and other sports, with articles appearing in The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, Reuters, Autosport and other publications. In 1999 he moved to Haymarket Publishing to become a senior editor at Autosport Special Projects, and one year later he became Autosport’s grand prix editor. In 2015 he moved to Motorsport Network, becoming the F1 editor for Motorsport.com. He is also a member of the Guild of Motoring Writers, and sits on the FIA Media Council.

Jonathan has won multiple awards for journalism - in 1991 he was the winner of the Guild of Motoring Writers’ Sir William Lyons’ Award for young journalists, in 2010 he was awarded the Outstanding Individual accolade for consumer journalism in the Haymarket wards, in 2011 he won Haymarket’s Scoop of the Year, and in 2018 he was awarded a prestigious Medaglia d’Oro at the Lorenzo Bandini Awards for his contribution to F1 journalism.