F1 legend Rubens Barrichello admits CRYING for a whole week after nervous start to racing career

Schumacher, Barrichello, 2002, Austria, Ferrari — Photo: © LAT Images

Rubens Barrichello

F1 legend admits CRYING for a whole week after nervous start to racing career

Rubens Barrichello struggled being away for his family when he first started his F1 career

Jenny Craig

Saturday 12 August 2023 23:27

Rubens Barrichello has opened up on his tough start on the road to becoming one of the most experienced F1 drivers in history.

The Brazilian has been extremely open about his difficult start to a sport which can unfortunately be tricky to breakthrough without significant financial backing.

Admirably, he has always looked back on his 19 year long career with gratitude and a few years ago in his ‘Beyond the Grid’ podcast episode, he described himself as, “someone that had no money” and therefore, “not a chance” in F1.

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Rubens Barrichello recalls his early steps

In a more recent interview, he recalled his first steps to becoming one of the most experienced drivers in the sport’s history:

“I was 16 when I moved to Italy, and I probably cried the whole first week,” he reflects. “I used to call my father once a week on a connect call to Brazil, and we couldn’t afford many of those calls.”

In previous interviews, he has spoken about his humble background, and that in order to have enough funding to make it to Formula 1, his family made a lot of sacrifices. One of those included his father, who sold his car to help start Barrichello’s early career.

“I knew when I drove for the first time in Europe that it was what I wanted,” he says. “I had no questions any more about the hard feelings of not being with my family. I learned languages – today I speak five languages because of the time I was by myself.

“I had the time to do stuff and learn about the cars, people say I am a good guy for car set-ups, and I did most of my learning in that period where I used to watch so much, I would see people building all the parts of the car, so it made me have a feeling for that, it helped a big way.”

He was 21 when he first joined the 1993 grid with Jordan and took his debut podium with the team one year later. Since then, he held the record for most race starts until Kimi Raikkonen overtook his incredible total of 322 in 2020.