The late Michele Alboreto would have been 61 today, so it seems appropriate to look back at what was probably his best F1 race.
After starting third, Alboreto put a glorious sliding overtake on Nigel Mansell at Ste. Devote to take second and set off after leader Ayrton Senna. He rapidly caught him and took the lead when Senna’s Lotus broke, only to lose it again a few laps later after running wide on the oil of someone else’s accident
That was pretty much the story of his race – a race where he overtook on the inside, the outside, at Ste. Devote, at Mirabeau, and where his fastest lap was over 1.2 seconds faster than anyone else’s.
Because of the sheer bad luck he’d had, second was still a mega result, though given his pace and prowess around the Principality it could (and perhaps should) easily have been an utterly dominant win.
With drives like this it’s little surprise that he was a serious championship challenger to Alain Prost that year until Ferrari’s reliability put an end to his hopes of title glory.
