Ayrton Senna and Xuxa, a true love story

Ayrton Senna took the initiative of calling Xuxa on the phone and propose her to start dating

The first weekend that Ayrton spent with Xuxa was in 1998, year when he won his first world championship. The Monday after, Ayrton arrived to visit Galvao Bueno (main sports anchorman of TV Globo, close friend of Ayrton’s) looking like a college boy in love.

The very busy work schedule of both of them made it impossible for Ayrton Senna and Xuxa to be together, although he wanted to marry her once he would leave Formula 1

According to other friend, Alfredo Popesco, Xuxa was a milestone in the life of Senna. “Xuxa came at the right moment”, says businessman Marcos Jose Magalhaes Pinto, another friend. 

The only time friends and family saw Ayrton Senna truly in love with a woman was with Xuxa. They stayed together fomr Christmas 1988 until the Monaco GP in 1990

”After becoming champion, he took a weight away from his shoulders, and opened space for a relationship”. Used to having girlfriends at his feet, Ayrton soon became upset with the full agenda of Xuxa, and particularly with the influence of the career manager Marlene Mattos over her (indeed, Marlene became famous in Brazil for two reasons: her full control over the steps of Xuxa and the fact that she remained faceless, away from photographers and cameras for a long time). In the beginning of 1989, the couple was at the Airport of Rio ready to fly to Monaco when Marlene showed up and said that Xuxa won’t go; the manager and the driver had a comic fight over the possession of the luggage; Xuxa and Ayrton eventually flew out. 

Ayrton Senna declared publicly that the only woman he wanted to marry and have children with, was Xuxa

At the Cristimas of that same year, when Senna was feeling down because of the loss of the championship, he decided to do a suprise to Xuxa, visiting her in New York. She knocked on her door, in a Santa Claus costume. She sent him off. Senna didn’t insist, and returned to Brazil. Until Senna’s death, Xuxa would call him periodically.

Due to the intensity of the feelings of Ayrton Senna towards her in life, Xuxa deserved a privileged place at the driver's funeral in 1994, at the Morumbi cemetery, going together with the Senna family to the grave