Lewis Hamilton crashed out of the Dutch Grand Prix on Sunday just as the pit-stop window opened. And it had repercussions for his teammate Charles Leclerc.
Hamilton lost control of his Ferrari at the banked turn three, where the drivers typically run close to the wall to carry maximum speed. The snap sent him into the barriers.
While it was a low-speed impact, it was enough to rip the front corner off the Ferrari and ended Hamilton’s afternoon. He had held onto seventh place after the start phase.
Leclerc had come into the pits moments before the accident. The safety car was deployed so the sister SF-25 could be recovered.
Charles Leclerc curses his luck after Lewis Hamilton crash at Zandvoort
Leclerc felt that the full-course caution had come at the worst possible time. His relatively early stop had demoted him to ninth place.
The Monegasque cleared George Russell’s Mercedes at the start of the race, promoting himself to fifth, and had been chasing the midfield outlier Isack Hadjar.
“No!” Leclerc bellowed in an unbroadcast radio message. “F—— hell! We are so f—— unlucky! Unbelievable!”
His competitors naturally took the opportunity under the safety car, but the damage wasn’t as bad as Leclerc likely feared. He only lost one position, falling behind Russell.
And following a virtual safety car phase later in the race, Leclerc caught the Mercedes driver by surprise. He dipped wheels in the gravel as he bullied his way back ahead at the penultimate corner, a move that will be investigated after the race.
It won’t cost Leclerc any points at the Dutch Grand Prix, though, because a collision with the other Silver Arrow of Kimi Antonelli on lap 53 ended his afternoon.
What Lewis Hamilton told Ferrari before race-ending accident
On the other side of the garage, Hamilton had been reporting tyre wear in the laps before he hit the wall.
He complained that the rears were ‘definitely wearing quite a lot’, which can induce oversteer. He’d also called for Ferrari to attempt an undercut on Russell because it was so difficult to pass on track.
Jacques Villeneuve noted that Hamilton was much more positive than Leclerc after qualifying. But the seven-time world champion looked disconsolate as he walked away from his stricken car on Sunday.
Hamilton spun multiple times during practice, which was perhaps a hint that the Ferrari was unstable. He also retired from last year’s United States GP due to a driver error.
- David Comerford
