The 1994 Formula 1 season was marred by controversy right until the end of the season when Damon Hill and Michael Schumacher infamously collided at the Australian Grand Prix.
Both drivers were trying to win their first world championship, with Schumacher and Hill separated by just one point heading into the final-round title showdown in Adelaide.
A win or finishing ahead of each other would seal the title, with Schumacher taking the lead at the start of the race. Hill was directly behind Schumacher for the first 36 laps, but as he caught up to the Benetton, Schumacher went off track at the East Terrace corner and hit a wall.
While Schumacher recovered, Hill attempted to pass him and the pair collided when the Benetton turned into the side of the Williams, briefly launching him airborne. Schumacher was eliminated on the spot, while Hill continued but would subsequently retire due to front left suspension damage.
As neither driver scored points the championship order stayed as it was going into the race, enabling Schumacher to win the first of his seven world titles. On the morning after the controversial race, Hill told the DRIVER podcast what he said to the German when he saw him at breakfast.
What Damon Hill told Michael Schumacher after he won 1994 title
It was a heartbreaking moment for Hill, and in later years he would go on to accuse Schumacher of deliberately driving into him.
When he saw the German on the morning after the race, he only had two words to say to him at the dinner table.
“Michael didn’t let people get to close to him, especially competitors, so I didn’t really [speak to him]. I saw him the next day at breakfast and said ‘Well done’ after he won the championship,” said Hill.
“He was a competitor and could demolish you with one sentence in the press. Nowadays, the drivers are very close, they do a lot of things together which we didn’t do when I was a driver.”
Damon Hill says Williams wanted to ‘move on’ after 1994
The stewards investigated the incident after the Grand Prix and branded it a racing incident, enabling Schumacher to keep his title win without risk of it being taken away.
Schumacher’s overtake was met with a lot of criticism, with many feeling that he did it deliberately to take out his title rival. Benetton was already accused of cheating throughout 1994, and this incident only made things worse for the German.
When asked if Williams ever considered appealing to the FIA, Hill claimed that there wasn’t an ‘appetite’ in the team to pursue any action because the team was still dealing with the death of Ayrton Senna.
“In any sport, there is rub of the green. There is a bad call, like the referee didn’t blow the whistle at the right time. That’s the vagueness of sport and once you enter the arena of sport, you have to abide by some officialdom. If it’s totally outrageous, you can appeal, but because of the season we had in 1994 there wasn’t an appetite to appeal. Everyone wanted to get the thing done and move on,” said Hill.
Hill would go on to win the title in his last year at Williams in 1996, while Schumacher would later be disqualified for a similar move on Jaques Villeneuve during the 1997 title showdown at Jerez.
