John Player & Sons, known simply as Player's, was a tobacco and cigarette manufacturer based in Nottingham, England. It is today a part of the Imperial Tobacco Group.

In March 1832, William Wright set up a small tobacco factory in Broadmarsh, Nottingham. This business expanded and earned Wright a comfortable fortune. John Player bought the business in 1877. He had the Castle Tobacco Factories built in Radford, Nottingham, just west of the city centre. He had three large factory blocks built, but initially only one was used to process and pack tobacco. The other two blocks were let to lace manufacturers until the business had expanded enough to use the additional space.

One of John Player's innovations was to offer pre-packaged tobacco. Before this, smokers would have bought tobacco by weight from loose supplies and cigarette papers to roll them in. He also adopted a registered trade mark as a guarantee to the public that the goods could be relied on.

The business was run later by Player's sons John Dane Player and William Goodacre Player.

Ayrton Senna da Silva (pronounced [aˈiɾtõ ˈsenɐ da ˈsiwvɐ] ( listen); 21 March 1960 – 1 May 1994) was a Brazilian racing driver. Senna was a three-time Formula One world champion and is widely regarded as one of the greatest F1 drivers of all time. He died in a crash at Tamburello corner while leading the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix and is the most recent driver to die at the wheel of a Formula One car.

Senna began his motorsport career in karting, moving up to open-wheel racing in 1981, and winning the British Formula 3 championship in 1983. He made his Formula One debut with Toleman-Hart in 1984 before moving to Lotus-Renault the following year and winning six Grands Prix over the next three seasons. In 1988, he joined Frenchman Alain Prost at McLaren-Honda. Between them, they won all but one of the 16 Grands Prix that year and Senna his first World Championship. Prost claimed the championship in 1989, and Senna his second and third championships in 1990 and 1991. In 1992, the Williams-Renault combination began to dominate Formula One. Senna nonetheless managed to finish the 1993 season as runner-up, winning five races and negotiating a move to Williams in 1994.