Formula One and a history of safety car crashes.
- Richard Baxter
- May 3, 2018
- 2 min read
During the Azerbaijan Grand Prix we saw Romain Grosjean suffer a bizarre incident under the safety car. Whilst weaving to try and keep heat in his tyres and brakes he ended his race by losing control and hitting the wall.
Grosjean told Sky Sports F1 “I was warming my tyres and I bumped into a switch which I changed position and when I touched the brakes, the rear wheels locked and I spun”.
There is a history of similar crashes though in Formula One.
Those who have listened to the latest NRF1 podcast reviewing Baku will have heard me reference a similar crash at the Monaco Grand Prix in 2004.
Under the safety car, whilst going through the tunnel, Michael Schumacher, leading the race, locked up and ran slightly wide, as he corrected this it was misjudged by Juan Pablo Montoya following, who then hit the back of his car forcing him in to the wall.
At the Brazilian Grand Prix in 2002 we saw another bizarre incident which was extremely close to tragedy. During the race warm up Enrique Bernoldi driving for Arrows crashed at the Senna ‘S’. A red flag was brought out to stop the session and the medical car put on track. Just as the medical car pulled up Nick Heidfeld driving for Sauber locked up and ran off the track. Just as the medical door opened up Heidfeld came across hitting the open door. A very close call for the medic about to step out.
In the 2012 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Sebastian Vettel was making his way through the field and came up behind Daniel Ricciardo. With the safety car out, as usual, all the drivers were weaving to warm their tyres. Vettel then misjudged his pace to Ricciardo in front and quickly closed up. Having to take evasive action he just missed the wall but took out the DRS zone track sign. Fortunately for him only suffering minor damage.
Similar to this of course was last years Azerbaijan Grand Prix with Vettel claiming Hamilton had “brake tested” him.
I’m sure I don’t have to explain any more on this!
Ultimately though Grosjean’s crash, whilst unfortunate and somewhat embarrassing is just the latest in a range of different crashes that we have seen under safety car conditions. And I am sure that it won’t be the last that we see.
And whilst it is easy to be critical of Grosjean, I’m not going to be, as I’m sure that it is a very easy thing to do – but maybe next time just concentrate a bit more.
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