Motorsport News 03/12/20

All attention will be focused on Monza in Italy this weekend as Elfyn Evans tackles the final round of this season’s World Rally Championship. The Welshman himself will be keeping an eye on the stages and also on the other side of the Toyota Gazoo Racing service park as he will go up against team-mate Sebastien Ogier. In the last month, Motorsport News has carried retrospective features on the last two Brits to win the ultimate prize in the WRC. Incredibly, it is 25 years since Colin McRae reached the summit and an improbable 19 since the feat was matched by Richard Burns. That both of these talents are no longer around to bask in their glories makes the wait for the UK’s next title winner even more painful. Both secured their…

Formula 1 managing director Ross Brawn has said lessons will be learned after Romain Grosjean’s miracle escape from an opening-lap fireball following a crash in Bahrain on Sunday. Brawn has promised a “deep” investigation after the accident for the Haas driver. Grosjean made contact with the AlphaTauri of Daniil Kyvat on the exit of Turn 3 and careered virtually head on into the barriers on the inside of the circuit. The monocoque of Grosjean’s Haas split the barrier as the car tore in two, which prompted a huge blaze. The Franco-Swiss driver was engulfed in the inferno for more than 15 seconds before he was able to extricate himself from the broken machine. He suffered burns to his hands and ankles but was otherwise uninjured. The race, which was eventually won by Lewis…

The crew of the Formula 1 medical car have been roundly praised for their role in helping remove Romain Grosjean from his burning Haas machine following the lap-one crash at Bahrain on Sunday. F1 doctor Ian Roberts and medical car driver and British Formula 3 champion Alan van der Merwe were first on the scene of the fireball. Haas boss Gunther Steiner said: “When you see something like this the only thing you think is ‘I hope we get lucky’ – you don’t think how it happened. I would like to thank all the marshals. They did a fantastic job to get him away as quick as possible from the fire. It was amazing what they did.” Van der Merwe, the 2001 Formula Ford Festival winner, has been F1’s medical car driver since…

Lewis Hamilton: It was such a shocking image to see. When I get in the car I know I am taking risks. I respect the dangers. I posted about it [on Twitter] during the break because it is horrifying. The car, the cockpit. I’m just so grateful the halo worked.” Max Verstappen: “It was scary. We saw a red flag, which doesn’t mean it’s immediately a bad thing. I saw a lot of fire and thought that is not a good thing. Luckily he is OK.” Sebastian Vettel: “I haven’t looked at the images a lot, because I didn’t want to, but a grand prix car and barrier are not supposed to fail like that. The car shouldn’t catch fire in that fashion, so I don’t know what happened there.” Daniil Kvyat: “At…

Lewis Hamilton took his 11th victory from 15 races in the 2020 Formula 1 season with a controlled drive on Sunday during the first of two grands prix on the Sakhir circuit in Bahrain. The Mercedes-Benz man, already crowned world champion, led away from pole position and benefited when his team-mate Valtteri Bottas, who had made a poor getaway at the original start which was abandoned after Romain Grosjean’s accident, dropped down to fourth place behind Max Verstappen’s Red Bull and the Racing Point of Sergio Perez. Apuncture then hampered Bottas further and he could only recover to eighth at the flag. Hamilton kept Verstappen at arm’s length throughout the 57-lap race but the Dutchman’s result has moved him to within 12 points of second place in the drivers’standings with two races remaining. Perez…

Mick Schumacher will go into the final rounds of this year’s Formula 2 championship with an 14-point lead over Callum Ilott after the Briton was penalised for an incident in the second race in Bahrain. Ilott had made inroads into Schumacher’s title advantage with a strong second place in the feature race on Saturday. The Virtuosi driver, who had qualified on pole position for the opener, lost out to eventual winner Felipe Drugovich while Jehan Daruvala was third. Schumacher had only qualified 10th but a swashbuckling start meant he climbed through the mid-order and he brought his Prema car home in fourth place. Ilott and Schumacher were destined to go toe-to-toe in the sprint race on Sunday while battling for fifth place after a mid-event safety car. However, when Schumacher locked up…