Jules Bianchi: 1989-2015

As an aspiring motorsport journalist, I am completely aware that I should remain impartial and not have my favourites when writing my articles and that it is unprofessional to do otherwise – but I am not a journalist yet. I am merely a regular fan of Formula 1 who is utterly devastated by the news of Jules Bianchi’s passing and I can’t write this piece without making it plainly obvious that Jules was, and will remain to be, an absolute hero and inspiration of mine.

I believe this might be one of the hardest things I have ever had to write – because Jules was taken far too soon, because he fought so hard for so long and because, I believe like all of us, I clung onto the hope that he’d surprise us all like he did in Monaco and recover. It’s taken so long to write this because it’s impossible to know what the right thing to say is, because I can’t say anything different to what’s already been said hundreds of times since Saturday morning and because the stories of his career and his talent and his powerful personality should be left to those who knew him.

I never met Jules – but I was lucky enough to experience some of his kindness last year at the post-Grand Prix Silverstone test, where he took time out of a meeting with Ferrari to sign the flag I’d been waving for him all weekend. This is a memory personal to me, but reading through all the tweets over the last few days, it seems that he was able to create hundreds of these moments for his fans and this is one of the many things he must be remembered for – not for what happened on Sunday October 5th 2014. Remember Brazil 2013, when his early season performance secured Marussia their first precious 10th place in the constructors. Remember Monaco 2014, the surprise, the skill, the jubilation and the fact he helped save a team. Remember all of the times he gave us someone else to root for, dragging more out of his Marussia than anyone thought possible. But most of all, remember him as he was, happy, smiling and living his dream.

It would have been fantastic to be able to watch him race in a Ferrari and who knows what he could have achieved, although they were surely destined to be great. Though we will never know what might have been, we know what was and we know that Jules leaves us with another achievement to add to his impressive list, because he has inspired so many to persevere, to keep going and keep fighting however big the challenge and however small the chances – to push and to never lift.

Tu nous manques et nos pensées et nos prières sont avec vous et votre famille toujours.

Au revoir Jules et merci beaucoup.

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