1989 Italian Grand Prix

Alain Prost took his fourth and final win of the season after McLaren teammate and pole-sitter Ayrton Senna suffered an engine failure with nine laps to go, thus extending the Frenchman's lead over the Brazilian in the Drivers' Championship to 20 points. Having earlier announced that he was moving to Ferrari for 1990, Prost dropped his winners' trophy from the podium into the crowd, to the severe disapproval of his team manager Ron Dennis . [ 1 ] [ 2 ] Gerhard Berger , the man Prost would be rep...

Before the Italian Grand Prix, Alain Prost announced that he had signed with Ferrari for the upcoming 1990 season. To the Tifosi who had previously seen Prost as the villain, he was now the hero of the crowd. It mattered not that he was still driving for McLaren , he was a confirmed Ferrari driver now and was treated as such (in previous years he had been jostled, jeered, and even pelted with tomatoes by some of the Tifosi for daring to beat the Ferraris). [ citation needed ]

Prost's announcement allowed Frank Williams to re-sign Riccardo Patrese for 1990 (Prost had offers from both Ferrari and Williams). Lotus also announced at the Grand Prix that they would be using the Lamborghini V12 engine in 1990. They also confirmed that their 1990 drivers would be Derek Warwick and the team’s test driver Martin Donnelly . For his part, Piquet claimed after the press conference that his reason for leaving Lotus was his belief that although it had potential, the under-developed...

Sixth was the AGS of Gabriele Tarquini , with Roberto Moreno 's Coloni seventh. Eighth was Larini's Osella team-mate Piercarlo Ghinzani , his eleventh pre-qualifying failure this season. As at the previous meeting, the Zakspeeds were ninth and tenth, Bernd Schneider again ahead of Aguri Suzuki . Argentine Oscar Larrauri had returned to EuroBrun for whom he raced in 1988, replacing Swiss driver Gregor Foitek , but with no improvement down in eleventh. Twelfth was the other AGS of Yannick Dalmas ,...

Prost's claims that Honda were favouring Senna were refuted by both Honda and McLaren boss Ron Dennis. However Prost's assertion was supported by former Honda drivers Mansell and 1982 World Champion Keke Rosberg who also told the press that when it became known they would not be driving Honda powered cars any more that their engines did not work as well or have as much power as was previous. BBC commentator Murray Walker also reported during the race itself that Prost was over 7 mph (11 km/h) sl...

Senna's time of 1:23.720 in his V10 McLaren-Honda was 2.254 seconds faster than he had been a year earlier in the turbocharged McLaren MP4/4 . His time was only 0.26 seconds shy of the fastest ever lap of the Monza circuit set by Nelson Piquet in a Williams -Honda in qualifying for the 1987 race when the turbo engines were developing some 300 bhp (224 kW; 304 PS) more than the naturally aspirated engines of 1989.

As the grid was in the process of forming up before the start, the McLaren team transferred the settings from Senna's car to Prost's in the hope of curing its handling problem (Prost had actually been more than 2 seconds slower in the race morning warm up than Senna). Prost would later say that while handling and grip were significantly improved, the down on power engine remained and despite the same wing settings he still could not match his teammate for straight line speed. [ 5 ]

Senna led from the start and built up a small lead over Berger, while Mansell (whose 'development' V12 engine was not revving right) and especially Prost struggled to stay in touch. Indeed, in the early stages of the race Prost, who was getting used to his cars new set up, was having a hard time holding off the V10 Williams - Renault of Thierry Boutsen , though the BBC's James Hunt explained that Prost was using a harder set of "B" compound tyres in the hope of not having to pit during the race.

Alessandro Nannini 's Benetton lost its brakes on lap 33 putting him into retirement, while Nigel Mansell suffered gearbox failure on lap 41. Through all of this, Senna was still comfortably in the lead with Prost having fought his way past Berger into second following Mansell's retirement. Prost passed Berger in front of the pits and the main grandstand and this saw the unusual sight of the Tifosi cheering when a McLaren passed a Ferrari. It must be remembered though that Prost was a confirmed ...

On lap 44 the roar of the crowd told the story as the V10 Honda in Senna's McLaren comprehensively blew up going into the Parabolica, dumping its oil onto the rear tyres and sending Senna into a gentle spin and retirement, handing Prost the lead which he held to win his first Italian Grand Prix since 1985 . Berger finished second for not only his first points of the season but indeed his first race finish while Boutsen came home third. Despite Prost's engine complaints, he still managed to set t...