Ayrton Senna
Ayrton Senna was Formula One's great romantic hero, a sportsman who transcended the limits of his chosen arena and touched the lives of millions across the world.
The Brazilian was arguably the fastest man ever to sit in a Grand Prix car.
Senna behind the wheel was like a force of nature, taking his machinery to limits few believed could exist, as his record of 65 pole positions in 162 races attests.
In races, he was remorseless and intimidating, but he also had an incredible delicacy of touch which was most apparent in wet weather, where he was untouchable.
He lived to drive F1 cars, and while his incredible self-belief and determination were vital parts of his armoury, they sometimes overwhelmed Senna himself as well as his rivals.
He dominated his teams as well as his rivals by the sheer force of his personality, but he also went beyond the pale in pursuing his goals, most notably in the title-deciding collision with his nemesis Alain Prost in Japan in 1990.
Senna was just as formidable a presence out of the car.
He had a magnetic charisma married to a formidable intellect, a poetic eloquence in several languages and a rare willingness to confront and discuss the risks of his chosen profession.
He also invested a lot of time and money in helping disadvantaged street children in his home country, Brazil, a fact he kept to himself until shortly before his death.
All this came together in a man who changed the face of his sport - for the worse, by changing forever what was acceptable in terms of on-track behaviour, and for the better by taking F1 to an entirely new audience.
His impact became truly clear when he was killed in the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix, an event that kept everything else off the top of news bulletins across the world.
