Death
In 1986 it looked as if Pironi would make a comeback when he tested for the French AGS team at Circuit Paul Ricard and subsequently, the Ligier JS27 at Dijon-Prenois. He proved that he was still fast enough to be competitive, but coming back to F1 was not truly practical.
His insurance policy had paid out a lot of money based on the fact that that Pironi's legs were injured so badly that he could never return to F1. Had he returned, he would have been legally obliged to pay all the money back.
Pironi decided to turn to offshore powerboat racing instead. On 23 August 1987, Pironi was killed in an accident in the Needles Trophy Race near the Isle of Wight, that also took the life of his two crew members: journalist Bernard Giroux and his old friend Jean-Claude Guenard. Their boat, "Colibri 4," rode over a rough wave caused by an oil tanker, causing the boat to flip over.
A few weeks after Pironi's death, his girlfriend Catherine Goux gave birth to twins. She named them Didier and Gilles, in honour of Pironi and Gilles Villeneuve, who died at the 1982 Belgian Grand Prix five years earlier.
Read more about this topic: Didier Pironi
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“‘Tis no great valor to perish sword in hand, and bravado on lip; cased all in panoply complete. For even the alligator dies in his mail, and the swordfish never surrenders. To expire, mild-eyed, in one’s bed, transcends the death of Epaminondas.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“The grief of the keen is no personal complaint for the death of one woman over eighty years, but seems to contain the whole passionate rage that lurks somewhere in every native of the island. In this cry of pain the inner consciousness of the people seems to lay itself bare for an instant, and to reveal the mood of beings who feel their isolation in the face of a universe that wars on them with winds and seas.”
—J.M. (John Millington)
“... probably all of the women in this book are working to make part of the same quilt to keep us from freezing to death in a world that grows harsher and bleaker—where male is the norm and the ideal human being is hard, violent and cold: a macho rock. Every woman who makes of her living something strong and good is sharing bread with us.”
—Marge Piercy (b. 1936)