Johhny Herbert: I thought I'd never race again

Just after 6 o’clock on an ill-lit November evening, a day where he had not long returned home from a blockbuster Brazilian Grand Prix, Johnny Herbert sits comfortably, legs folded, beer in hand in the business suite of the St Pierre Hotel. It’s cold, wet & windy outside, but Herbert, despite being fatigued by jet lag, is bright-eyed and ready to talk about the defining moment in his two-decade-long career in Motorsport.

It has been almost 29 years since a handful of Formula 3000 spectators were not entirely sure what they had just heard. Out of sight, before the cars came in to view below the bridge, a thunderclap of shocking energy resonated through the concrete parapet of Brands Hatch and out into the surrounding woodland.

A split-second earlier, Herbert was at the forefront of an ear-splitting double-impact crash which rang out obscenely through the grandstand.

The crash was, for Herbert, a violent conclusion to what was one of the largest chain-reaction accidents ever to occur on British racing asphalt. In seconds, the undulating stretch of track resembled the scene of an aircraft disaster. Amid the dense forest of the Brands Hatch Grand Prix loop, a motorsport horror had played out in a shower of wheels and carbon fibre, amongst a fervent ambition that for Johnny had been, self admittedly, burned far too intensely that afternoon.

“Going into the Brands [Hatch] weekend, I was on such a high, I was probably over confident after hearing my name associated with the likes of Williams, Lotus, Benneton and Ferrari.

“I qualified on pole and I knew if I got away well the others would struggle to catch me. The lights went out and I was gone, but a few laps in I saw red flags so the race was restarted and it was back to the grid.

“The second restart was a shocker for me and it was dominoes from there. I remember the crash coming up so fast and I remember it all so well. My rear right was [Wheel] was clipped and I lost control of the car, so I braced myself for impact. My head jolted forward and I was spinning around, my car had exited under the bridge sideways after that initial impact, then about another 20 meters down with the front of the car already missing I had the second hit with my feet hanging out the front.

“I remember opening my eyes, looking down where the rest of the car should have been and all I could see was this big hole and my first thought was that I had lost my legs from the knee down and that I’d never race again.”

Fortunately for the then 24-year-old, that was not the case. Herbert suffered several career-threatening injuries, most severely to his lower legs, ankles and feet. The threat of amputation loomed for a while, only passing after multiple surgeries and months of physiotherapy, though the extent of his injuries would permanently hinder his mobility.

“The therapy and surgeries weren’t over such a long period, but it felt like a lifetime. I had lost parts of my toes, my heel wasn’t where a heel should be and I was told I’d struggle to run ever again.

“But, for me, it wasn’t about running, walking or dancing. Although I can still cut a shape or two (he chuckled). It was about racing. Everything I had done up until that point in my life had been about racing. I just wanted to race.”

And race he did! In quite remarkable fashion, against all the odds, by 1989 Johnny Herbert was back in the monocoque of a racing car, and this time on the most elite stage of all… Formula 1.

“It was a dream come true to be able to race again, let alone be behind the wheel of a Formula 1 car. I met with the guys at Benneton and they helped me train. I was power walking at altitude, swimming & biking mile after mile, until eventually, I was fit enough to challenge the likes of Senna, Mansell, Prost."

On March 26th 1989, the true test of how well Johnny had recovered from his terrible injuries was to come, when he made his F1 race debut for Benetton in Brazil. He finished an amazing fourth, behind winner Nigel Mansell, McLaren's Alain Prost, and local hero Mo Gugelmin. His teammate, Alessandro Nannini, was sixth. It was the most stunning F1 debut for nearly 20 years. But Johnny was suffering, and the quick circuit wasn't a reliable indicator of how far down the road to recovery he had travelled.

"I was in pain," says Herbert. "I always remember when I first went out qualifying that there was a particularly big bump at the hairpin before the back straight, which really hurt my left foot when I hit it. I learned to let my foot just flop around and, when I hit the bump, it would hit the side of the cockpit. It would hurt like hell but sort of killing the pain after that.

“All in all, I had a decent career in F1, I won a few races, set a few fastest laps, but I’d have loved to have been World Champion. That’s the only missing piece in my puzzle.”

Although what happened in 1988 at Brands Hatch did affect what Johnny went on to do competitively, the cheeky chap from Essex will always remain one of Formula One’s nice guys.