1976: Lauda on F1 safety

"My personal opinion is that the Nurburgring is too dangerous to drive on nowadays. Because, if I go to Paul Ricard or any other permanent circuit and something breaks on my car, the wing falls off, the suspension fails, I have a 70/30 percent chance that I will be all right or I will be dead. Because of the circumstances of the circuit.

"We're not discussing if I make a mistake. If I make a mistake and I kill myself, then tough shit. If I have been so stupid to make a mistake, to kill myself, this is my risk in motor racing. I have to be fit. I have to be mentally free to drive my car concentrated on not making mistakes. So, Nurburgring, if you have any failure on the car, hundred percent death."



"Yes, I was lucky. I was sliding six hundred metres and if they had a brick wall... You know what I mean. You can have accidents and the car is just in a thousand pieces and you get out of it, you have nothing, if you are lucky. You know, I can't rely on luck. You know why Hailwood is alive? Because he was lucky. Normally, there is no way out of an accident like this.

"I look at other circuits, where the safety facilities provide a much easier, a much safer driving, and I compare to the Nurburgring with 260 kilometre-an-hour jumping - only God saves you. So therefore I think it is too dangerous. I was against the Nurburgring because I think it should be like any other circuit, up to the standards. Why do they do the work, if the Nurburgring doesn't? They say, we are 22 kilometres long. But they don't say, we have 300,000 spectators. You know what I mean. They make more money, they are going to have to spend it."



" I don't know. The best thing is to shorten the place. Leave in as many jumps as you want, leave in as many hairy places as you want, but just make the guardrail to be back 30 metres. So if really something happens, you don't go like Hailwood straight in."



"Sure. I don't care what they do, but they should bring it up to normal standards. As long as, you know, on a jump where easy something can go wrong with my car, I need runoff. All I want is to have, the more dangerous it is, the wider I need run-off area.

"I was there when they had the drivers' meeting, to say what to do. Some people said that for the sport we have to go this year to help the organizers. We should be cooperative and all that. My opinion was that the risk is too high that somebody gets killed or badly hurt, just to be fair. I think the risk involved in being fair is too much.

"But this is my personal opinion. I am a member of the GPDA, and we voted, and the vote was to go. Some of the drivers think for the sport it's very important we can't kill a race like this. But we go this year only, and next year they have to modify it.



"For me the problem is, easily somebody can get killed there. I think human life is more important than more bloody motor racing. The question now is, what is more important, that you see at the Nurburgring Mister Lauda jumping farther than Mr. Guy Edwards, ten metres more, really struggling to get out there to the Schwalbenschwanz and maybe in the race somebody gets killed; or you see maybe a little bit less hairy driving but at least safer for the drivers."



"Depends. If the public comes to see blood and death, OK, these people will go. But I think the majority are coming to see good motor racing. This doesn't mean fire, blood and death, it means fighting, driving, sliding maybe, different cars, different nationalities, racing, challenge, risk.

" If we look back in the past, why is the development of safety coming up? Because everybody understands there is no point in just killing people. The sport, it doesn't get better, it gets worse. If you say, motor sport is only good because every year one guy or two guys are being killed, OK, you have a different opinion. If you say the people come to see people dead, I wouldn't understand. I wouldn't understand them at all. Then I 'm completely out of it."



"Only in case of technical failures. I made a mistake, and I hit the guardrail head on, I'm dead, tough shit. The drivers have to try to stay alive, working precisely, being fit. But what happens if something comes off these bloody cars? We have engineers in motor racing with degrees from University and whatever; always things falling off. Why. Because we drive on the limit.

"If you would take a bicycle, every day you want to go quicker, it will break all the time. Logic. Because this is doing development. But do we have to take the risk, the drivers, to get killed because of a logical development? No. So you have to do something outside, on the circuit, because you can calculate everything but it still breaks.

"The only thing I want is that the driver is not a dummy, just watching the way the guardrail is going to hit his face. The human driver, as a human being, should always have the possibility until his last second to try to change things, that he doesn't get killed. Because to be a dummy, to sit in something and do nothing, just to watch when you get killed, is not funny, I think. It's not good for the people; if we would be an animal, all right, I have no brains, so...

"But this is the only concern to me, to bring the safety up to that point where the driver is at least able to do a little Bit that he is just hurt, maybe, if something comes off my car or somebody hits me. That's all I want, that I don't be the dummy."



"I enjoy the challenge of working with cars, preparing cars, developing cars. I enjoy all the technical work with the machine, with the engine, with the tyres, everything. This I enjoy. And if you want to call it a sport, all right, but I think the word sport is wrong. You need to create a new word for, for motor racing. Half sport, half technic."



"Depends how competitive it is. You know what I mean. If there are, let's say, two people competitive, everybody enjoys it. One of the two will win. Easy life. All the rest know there is no way they are going to win. So they go for the sport, for enjoyment, to go with the women, to have drinks; you know what I mean.

"But nowadays unfortunately there are 30 Formula 1 cars practising, 30, and maybe ten who can win. Each of us has first to qualify, and then ten people can win. A big difference. That means you have to work much more, and therefore all the rest, the nice enjoyment, is gone, because the word "work" took place where the "enjoyment" was. There's no time left, because the day only has twelve hours."



"Yeah. It's the way to go. As you see."



"Yes, sure, I enjoy it. It's wrong to say I enjoy the driving plus the technic. I enjoy first the driving and then the technic."



"Yes. If it's necessary, yes."



"Listen, every Grand Prix is bloody hard work! All the pressure. To say I enjoy now the next two hours coming up, no, I wouldn't say. Because it's bloody hard, bloody difficult, and you know a lot of things can happen. A lot of question marks. I think the enjoyment will stop when the race comes, because then I want to be as accurate and precise as possible. To do my job.

"But I enjoy all the work before, the, the, you know what I mean, to get to this point. This is what I enjoy. It's the same thing when you write an article, for example. You first just put all the ideas down quickly, brbrbrbrbrp! This you enjoy. After, you have to go and check if everything is right, to make it fit the space, to cut away a bit, to add a little bit. This for sure you don't enjoy. It's difficult."



"No, but I try to think what it must be. So you understand, with my car before the race I did all my brbrbrbrbrp! and I have a good car, but now I must do the work."



"To get the best out of the possibility I have. Even if I finish a race, for example, I am tenth, I might be happier being tenth one day than if I would win the race. Because maybe, in the race I won, I made mistakes, and maybe when I was tenth I didn't make any mistakes and tenth was the maximum I could do with the car.

"For example, winning the, oh, the Monte Carlo Grand Prix, I made no mistakes, none. It was for me a better win than Zolder. Because in Zolder I made a big cockup. I thought something broke on my car, when I hit the oil, and I slowed right down. I was going to go into the pits. Took me half a lap to realize, it's only oil, and Clay nearly caught me up.

"So I was upset after Zolder. I nearly threw the victory away, thinking something broke, but I just hit some oil I didn't see. This is a cockup, a mistake, I never should do. I was upset. I try to do the best with the possibilities I get. If I'm happy about myself, then everything's all right."



"After a GP I need at least two days, no cars. The worst for me, it's happened a couple of times, is a test laid out the day after a race. It's impossible for me to do. Because I'm tired. I'm tired and weak. When you're tired you can't feel the bloody car, and when you're tired you're not concentrating. It's a risk, not to be hundred percent concentrated. It's a risk to be weak and drive the car. It's a risk and what for I should take it? So I need Monday and Tuesday at least to be relaxed, at home.



"Sleep. Go home, sleep. I can't sleep anymore in the afternoon, which sometimes I do. Two years ago I slept 12 hours, now I sleep nine and I can't sleep any more. Because I'm getting tired, I'm getting overrevved. Sure, because if you do things every day, you know, travelling, heat, cold, Brazil, ten hours time difference, back, testing, you know what I mean, for me is tiring. I don't know about the other people.

"This is why I just can't do everything on the outside which everybody wants me to do. I can't go and speak to the public, please the public, when in the same time I am so tired that I lose all my strength. The most important thing is having 16 races a year. To calculate the season. There's no point in rushing like hell the first ten races, and in the last six you're just finished. Because you can't cope with testing, travelling, racing, speak-ing, signing autographs. I'm only a, a, human being. I only have one body. I only have that much strength, and that strength I have to divide, during the season. To be able to be fit in Tokyo as I am fit in Brazil.

"Therefore. As soon as I realize I am getting tired, because I have to test too much or it's too hot, or whatever, I just close everything and try to save myself. There's no way I'm going to wear myself out just to be a good World Champion. That the people say, "Lauda! Fantastic! He makes jokes, the whole thing ..." You know? But it's my substance which goes away.

"To win races I have to be strong and fit. But the night before the race they say, Oh, I have a party and you must come, and it is at eleven o'clock the night before the Monaco Grand Prix; OK, I was there, I said hello to him, I said hello to her, and I left the same moment. Because it's no point, to stay around, to shake hands, to keep smiling, so people will say, "Oh, Lauda is here, very nice guy, sympatique, smoking with us" - you know what I mean. Because I have to drive the next day. They enjoy, they watch, they look. I risk my life and I have to win. Because I'm employed to win. If I don't I will get half money and I m finished.

"So which is important? To make the big show, to have long hair, to be in the evening around with girls, to live, I don't know, the Playboy life, arrive with a Rolls-Royce or a Cadillac, whatever - or to be able to win. I think to win is the better show."