Castel San Pietro (Bologna), 1 May 2024 – Furniture they are the same as 30 years ago. The desk is on the left. Nearby there is a lamp, a little further on the suitcase rack and the light wooden wardrobe. In the center, guarded by a painting, that bed where Ayrton Senna he slept his last night.
It was April 30, 1994. Room 200, second floor of theHotel Castello Of Castel San Pietroin the province of Bologna.
Five minutes by helicopter and here is theImola Autodrome. In those days a custom for pilots. So much so that “Mr. Senna”, repeats the owner with respect and affection Luisa Tosoni, becomes fond of the hotel. From 1989, the year the structure opened, to that cursed weekend 30 years ago where Senna died on the track.
“A simple person, always polite and polite. Every time he arrived he shook hands. He always asked how my husband and I were doing Valentino Tosoni, whether or not we had received tickets for the trials and competitions”, says Luisa. They are in a glass display case the memorabilia given as gifts by Senna fans who have been coming back and forth from all over the world since 1994 to pay homage to him.
Ayrton’s face is imprinted on wine labels, on vinyl, on book covers. From the reception Luisa takes out a large diary. On the pages there are poems, texts, letters and messages written in all languages. English, Portuguese, Spanish, French, German, Japanese. “Who knows, one day with all these dedications I could make a book”, says Luisa.
That devotion which a French friend of the pilot demonstrated every year. “From 1995 to 2022, she always slept in room 200, on April 30th. She booked in advance and put Mr. Senna’s painting on the desk.” A ritual that five Maltese fans also respect. At 11 they are ready to visit that room that made history. And to say that the pilot “never chose her, he didn’t ask. It was the first time she slept in this suite”, continues Luisa.
Then, that backstory from four years earlier, told through tears: “I was pregnant with my first child and we had all been talking together until late in the evening. Then, my water broke. On the day of the Grand Prix, after the race, the Mr. Senna congratulated my husband on the birth of our son. When he arrived at the hospital he had with him a gorgeous bouquet of flowers. ‘You’re exaggerating,’ I told him. He replied that it was not his work but a tribute from Mr. Senna“.
A sign of the relationship of trust and respect that had been created. So much so that I recommend them the typical trattoria where to eat, the “Romagnola”and keep that place reserved for him in the veranda room for meals.
However, habits that death has changed. But that room, the only one of the 63 in the Hotel Castello, remained there until 1994. Because, as Luisa says, “if 30 years later it’s still like this belovedI say that before being a champion on the track he was a champion as a man.”
