The emptiness after Lauda: Formula 1 without heart and soul

Toto Wolff always carries memories of his friend Niki Lauda with him. The team boss of series champion Mercedes still has text messages from Lauda saved on his cell phone. Sometimes Wolff retrieves them and reads them. “We have lost the heart and soul of Formula 1,” he said after the death of his Austrian compatriot on May 20, 2019, adding: “I miss him as a sparring partner, but above all as a friend.” Two greats among themselves: Alain Prost (left) and Niki Lauda. © APA/afp / GERARD FOUET

Lauda, the man with the red cap, was a Formula 1 icon. Despite severe burns and a corroded lung, he miraculously survived a horror accident at the Nürburgring on August 1, 1976. In the hospital, a priest gave the world champion his last rites. “But I didn’t want to die, I wanted to continue living,” emphasized Lauda after the flaming inferno on the Nordschleife. Images of the tragedy have long since become embedded in the collective memory.

Just 42 days later he was back in the racing car in Monza and came fourth. “How can the idiot drive again if he has just burned to death?” Lauda once asked on behalf of all the critics and doubters. “The quick return was part of my strategy to not sit at home for long and think about how and why the whole thing happened to me.” Donor lung and death of Niki Lauda In August 2018, one of the greatest racing drivers in history received a donor lung after his condition deteriorated dramatically. Lauda fell asleep peacefully in the University Hospital in Zurich in May 2019. Hundreds then paid their last respects to Austria's national hero in St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna. Niki Lauda was paid his last respects in St. Stephen's Cathedral. © APA/afp / JOE KLAMAR

Lauda has left a vacuum in Formula 1, which so urgently needs characters who also build a bridge to a long-gone motorsport era. Lauda also left a vacuum at Mercedes - not least emotionally. His position on the supervisory board was filled and his team shares were returned to the company - but the Silver Arrows lack Lauda as a corrective, as a compass, as a comrade.

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The emptiness after Lauda: Formula 1 without heart and soul

A year ago the Austrian Formula 1 legend Niki Lauda died. The man with the red cap has left a vacuum in racing.

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