He left on April 25th. Four months after Christmas Day. We're getting a little off track, or rather off track, you might say. But on the occasion of the 1987 holidays he showed up together with Ezio Zermiani in Piazza Duomo in Milan aboard the F40 to send Ferrari's best wishes to all Italians. It was another Italy. And another F1…
Perhaps a warning sign, as if he had known in advance that the following season would be his last in a car from that company. Exactly twenty-three years ago Alboreto left us.
On the number of Sports Week of last March 2, Candido Cannavò's article from April 30, 1984, the day after Michele's first success with the Rossa, was re-proposed.
The man he could have given to Maranello the last World Championship with Enzo Ferrari still alive: in 1985 he fought with Alain Prost for the title, but the Drake abandoned the German KKK turbines, a company suspected of being in cahoots with the Porsche-branded McLarens.
Zermiani recalled that episode on Domenica Sportiva on 29 April 2001, four days after Michele's death, stating: “Ferrari is indebted to Alboreto”.
A personal memory of the Milanese pilot: when he showed Stella Bruno an image in which he and Elio De Angelis pretended to punch each other. “I care a lot about this photo,” he said. This shows the character of a man who knew how to go beyond the scope of the track.
![Michele Alboreto](https://www.formulacritica.it/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Alboreto-jpg.webp)
The asphalt. Precisely what was fatal to him in 2001. An accident at the Lausitzring while he was testing the new Audi R8 Sport in preparation for the 24 Hours of Le Mans cost him his life.
Michele was facing a straight line and, going off the track, he hit a fence on the right and overturned after a flight of about a hundred metres.
Death came instantly. A fatality, the subsequent investigation established, given that the crash was started by a puncture in the left rear tire which caused the gradual loss of pressure until failure. An investigation that closed many controversies and above all relieved the pilot of responsibility.
Three days later an emotional crowd greeted Alboreto, in Basiglio. That same public that has not forgotten a classy driver, a man of superior caliber and who still remembers his exploits after 23 years.
Hi Michele.
Crediti foto: F1