Michael Schumacher contemplated giving up motor racing after the death of Ayrton Senna. The six-times Formula One world champion revealed yesterday that he felt “lost” after the fatal crash at the start of the San Marino Grand Prix ten years ago and questioned whether he could carry on in the sport.

A day before the race, Roland Ratzenberger, the Austrian driver, had also been killed in a high-speed accident at the Imola circuit in Italy.

Schumacher said: “I still have those pictures in my mind as I was driving right behind him (Senna). I must say the whole weekend was terrible because the day before Roland Ratzenberger already had his accident. All of this was a shock for me — for all of us. When I heard what had happened I was completely lost. It was the very first time I had been confronted with death in my sport. To be honest, I thought those things were in the past and wouldn’t happen any more.

“After Imola, I doubted for quite a while if I even wanted to go on racing. Ayrton was a great loss to the whole of motor sport. He was an inspiration not only to me, he was a symbol for the sport because he gave so much to it.”

Schumacher was speaking as the tenth anniversary of Senna’s death approaches. Memorials are planned during the San Marino Grand Prix in a fortnight, but tens of thousands of fans at the race in Italy will focus around Schumacher, who went on to take the title in 1994 and is now the most prolific winner in the history of the sport, overtaking Senna’s record of 41 victories.

Senna, though, still holds one record, that of 65 pole positions, but the German driver has a chance to close in on that number at Imola. After three poles this season, Schumacher’s record stands at 58.